m 



rLIBRARYOF CONGRESS.5 



UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 



THE PARTING WORDS 



ADOLPHE MONOD 



"... Those touching and edifjing addresses published under the title 
of ' The Adieux of Adolphe Monod.' The speaker was a French Protestant 
pastor, eminent for piety and for his extraordinary abilities as a preacher. 
The pulpit from which he spoke — and it is sometimes the most effective 
of ail pulpits — was a death-bed, around which, Sunday by Sunday (for 
he lingered long), he gathered as many members of his little flock as the 
sick-room would hold, and received with them the Holy Communion, and 
spoke to them of such subjects as the ' Regrets of a Dying Man.' " 
Edward Meykick Goulbourn, D. D., 

Dean of Norwich, etc. 



LES ADIEUX D'ADOLPHE MONOD. 



THE PAETING WORDS 



ADOLPHE MONOD 



TO HIS FRIENDS AND THE CHTJRCH. 



s 

OCTOBER, 1855, TO MARCH, 1856. 



[TRANSLATED FROM THE FIFTH PARIS EDITION.] 



NEW YORK: ^? 
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 
549 & 551 BROADWAY. 
1873. 



[THE LIBRAmY] 

oï c owGm »ts| 
washingtom] 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in tlie year 1873, 
Bt D. APPLETOÏJ" & CO., 
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at "Washington. 



PEEFAOE. 



Adolphe Monod was removed from the church on 
earth on the 6th of April, 1856, after an illness of two 
years. The first six months of this illness were passed 
in compulsory repose and inactivity; then came six 
months in which he continued his ministry in spite of 
advancing disease ; and finally, nearly a year of suffer- 
ing (as he said himself ) — suffering constantly increas- 
ing in intensity and persistency. 

The addresses now presented to the public were 
delivered dnring the antnmn and winter of 1855-56, 
beginning from the time that he first knew his malady 
was incurable, and continuing until the day it pleased 
God to put an end at once to his preaching and his 
sufferings. 

Toward the close of September, 1855, Monod and 
his family recognized the grave character of his dis- 
ease, and from that time he prepared himself peace- 



6 



PREFACE. 



fully for his départ ure, if such were the will of God, 
without, however, either losing the hope of recovery 
or ceasirig to désire it ; trusting indeed that the Lord 
might accomplish for him what human art could not 
venture to hope for. He felt then the need of drawing 
still closer to God, and when one of his friends — a col- 
league in the ministry — spoke to him of the Holy 
Comninnion "as a most powerful and too~much-neg- 
lected means of grâce, counselling him to avail himself 
of it frequently," he gladly accepted his advice, and 
determined to commune every Snnday, inviting in 
tnrn ail the friends who might désire to receive with 
him to do so. 

He hoped, indeed to, do still more. Having felt 
himself able, twice in the space of a few days, to ad- 
dress his family at considérable length, he was so 
much enconraged, that he conceived the idea of avail- 
ing himself of the occasion of the weekly communion, 
to speak a few words to the friends who might be prés- 
ent. This was the origin of the regnlar Sunday ser- 
vices in his sick-room. The first took place on 
October 14, 1855, and they were continued without 
interruption until March 30, 1856. 

An opportunity of preaching the Gospel being once 
again granted him, in embracing it, Monod signally 
displayed the spirit of Christian liberality and breadth 



PREFACE. 



1 



of view with which lie was so deeply imbued, and 
which gave liim prominence not only in his own 
Church, but in tlie ivhole Chureb of tbe faitbful at large. 
He looked upon ail as brotbers who sbared bis faith, 
to whatever particular Christian dénomination tbey 
migbt belong, and bence tbe pastors of tbe Reformed 
Church, and the Lutheran, tbe Independent, and Wes- 
leyan, eacb in turn presided at tbe feast of brotherly 
love, at the bedside of their suffering and dying 
brotber. He added thus to tbe bappiness of working 
for the Gospel the joy (to use bis own words) of labor- 
ing for " tbat church of the future to which we ail look 
forward," and with which he wished now to unité bim- 
self in anticipation. 1 

The service was celebrated in the bedroom of the 
sufferer. The bread and the cup were placed upon a 
table near his bed, and at tbe table stood the officiat- 
ing pastor. Monod's family with a small number of 
friends (in ail from thirty to forty persons) occupied 
seats around him, of which there were always too few, 
however sparingly the invitations were necessarily is- 

1 It may perhaps interest the reader to know the names of the sev- 
eral pastors who in turn performed the service. They were, Messrs. Fred- 
erick Monod, William Monod, Meyer, Grandpierre, Gauthey, Vaurigand 
(of Nantes) Vallette, Armand-Delille, Vermeil, Fisch, John Monod, Ed- 
mond de Pressensé, Petit, Paumier, Zipperlen, Hocart, Louis Yernes, 
Boissonnas, and Vulliet. 



8 



PKEFACE. 



sued. He made it a point to vary the little congré- 
gation from week to week, and tiras to receive ail in 
turn, who had requested the privilège of being prés- 
ent. 1 The services consisted of an invocation, followed 
by singing a psalm or hymn, a prayer, and the read- 
ing of a chapter from the Bible, and then the admin- 
istration of the Sacrament, after which Monod began 
his discourse. 

Those who had heard him on previous occasions, 
before"his illness, could form some idea of the peaceful 
serenity which pervaded his manner and tone ; of his 
earnest Christian love toward those whom he was ad- 
dressing ; of his occasional energy and winning, per- 
suasive éloquence : but only those who heard him in 
thèse his last days, can really feel and appreciate ail 
that he was. 

The service, as we h ave already seen, was the resuit 
of circumstances, and had been neither premeditated 
nor prepared in advance. The same may be said. of 
the words of the pastor. Oftentimes he was not a 
preacher exhorting his flock, but rather a suffering 

1 In the month of March, owing to his failing strength, Monod was 
able to receive his friends in his bedroom for an hour only, and at the 
last four services they were obliged to stand round his bed to hear his 
discourse, retiring afterward into an adjoining room, where the Holy 
Communion was administered, which was brought to the sufferer by the 
ofïïciating clergyman. 



PREFACE. 9 

brother — a brother on the brink of the grave — giving 
counsels, and warnings gathered from his own expéri- 
ence. He spoke with much simplieity, and in the 
easy, familiar style which will be noticed in the follow- 
ing pages. On the other hand, the sonorous voice of 
his earlier days often retnrned to him with the earnest, 
vivid, spontaneous train of thought and manner, and 
the rapid, convincing accent which distinguished him 
in former times. Deprived of the ministry to which 
he had formerly devoted himself, and which indeed 
was his life, this new ministry became very dear to 
him, humble and small in comparison though it ne- 
cessarily was, from the condition of his health and the 
circnmstances cormected with it. He spoke as his 
strength would permit, and was always too feeble to 
exert himself for any length of time. Longprepara- 
tory labor was of course out of his power ; so he con- 
teuted himself at first with a few moments' méditation 
on the subject upon which he was about to speak. 
His ideas were either drawn from his own expérience, 
or suggested by renection in the course of the week ; 
sometimes he consulted with those about him upon the 
choice of a subject, and often his own sufferings fur- 
nished it, and he delighted then to show forth how a 
Christian should employ his suffering for the glory of 
God. 



10 



PREFACE. 



Soine time later, finding tliat his ]ife was prolongée! 
beyond his anticipations, and that God was calling 
him to suffer and to teach from his bed of suffering for 
a longer time than be bad at first contemplated, be 
desired to eollect and unité such of bis lectures as 
would admit of it into groups; bence arose two séries. 
Tbe first consists mainly of counsels drawn from bis 
own expérience, under tbe title " Regrets of a Dying 
Man." In tbe second, he exbibits tbe results 1 (as he 
calls tbem) to wbicb bis expérience and faitb had led 
bim. He prepared bimself now witb more care, 
spending part of Saturday and sometimes of Saturday 
nigbt in dictating notes at considérable lengtb, wbicb 
indeed sometimes amounted to tbe lecture itself, and 
then bad tbese notes read over to bim sbortly before 
he began to speak. He soon found, however, that this 
metbod cramped his freedom, for he felt bound to 
follow exactly tbe plan which be had traced in ad- 
vance, and this often led him too far, causing him 
fatigue, for be went beyond tbe limits assigned bim by 
his strength in order to complète tbe development 
of bis tbougbts as sketched in the notes. So, after 
baving prepared four lectures in this manner (those 

1 Thèse tîtles are thus given by Monod bimself. The first séries com- 
prises Nos. XHI.-XYIII. ; the second Nos. XIX.-XXIII. To the latter 
he adds also No. X. 



PKEFACE. 



11 



delivered in the month of February), be abandoned it 
and retnrned to bis original plan. 

It is certainly surprising that, suffering as be was 
day and nigbt from pain, always acnte and sometimes 
extrême, Monod sbould bave been able to bear tbe 
fatigue of a service of an hour's duration every Snnday, 
in addition to tbe labor of composing and delivering a 
discourse sometimes several pages in lengtb. We bave 
seen bow be prepared bimself in tbe few moments of 
freedom from pain tbat were granted bim, and even 
during bis suffering and in spite of it. Tbe fatigue 
occasioned by tbeir delivery was doubtless very great. 
His organs of speecb had, bowever, preserved an ex- 
traordinary vigor, and it was astonisbing to bear so 
firm and strong a voice from a frame so broken and 
wasted witb disease. Tbe effort be was forced to 
make to collect and fix bis tbougbts and clotbe tbem 
in words — offcen at tbe moment enduring acutest pain 
— could not fail to react upon bim with increased suf- 
fering. 

But God voucbsafed bim on eacb Sunday, as in- 
deed on eacb day of tbe week, the necessary measure 
of relief, or of patience and energy. Sometimes bis 
pains left bim, or at ail events were alleviated for a 
sbort time, and sometimes he so far controlled and mas- 
tered bis suffering as to be able to speak in spite of it. 



12 



PREFACE. 



The hours which iinmediately followed tbe service 
were frequently raost painful, especially at first. He 
knew it, but resigned himself cheerfully. 

" I am suffering very much," lie said one Sunday 
evening, " but so it nrnst be from Sunday to Monday 
morning ; it is a sacrifice that I gladly ôffer to God." 

On another occasion, in one of bis prayers, be says : 
" And if eacb week tbe privilège of preacbing Thy 
word be mine, at tbe cost of redoubled suffering to 
myself, Tby will and not mine be doue ! " 

On Nbvember 25tb (we like to quote Monod's 
own words, tbat tbe reader may tbe better understand 
bis feelings in relation to bis new ministry) be says : 

" I suffered very mucb tbis morning ; tbere was 
even reason to fear tbat I migbt not be able to speak ; 
but God relieved me from pain for an bour, expressly 
to permit me to glorify Him, and bas given me grâce 
to fulfil once more tbe duties of tbe humble ministry 
wbicb is so great a consolation to me." 

On Marcb 2d, a month before bis deatb, be says : 
"We have reacbed another Sunday, and God bas per- 
mitted me to say a few words to my little flock, in 
spite of tbe increasing weakness to wbich my failing 
voice bears witness. May He deign to support me 
even unto tbe end, and if it be possible (for far be it 
from me to prescribe to Him), may He grant me tbe 



PREFACE. 



13 



gracious favor that I may not cease to proclaim His 
name until I cease to live ! " 

God did support him unto the end, and granted 
him the last favor for which he prayed. Dating from 
October 14th, the service was celebrated every Sun- 
day during nearly six months. On Easter-day, March 
23d, he was able to deliver his last lecture, upon the 
Eesurrection of Jésus Christ, but it was only after long 
uncertainty as to whether he were strong enough, and 
with so much difficult effort, that he appeared to faint 
as he uttered the last words. 

On March 30th, although his weakness had been 
for several days so rapidly increasing that he was 
almost unable to take nourishment, and could only 
speak with extrême difficulty, " hardly knowing if he 
could make him self heard, he summoned up ail his 
little remaining strength to glorify the eternal and in- 
finité love of God," and by an act of thanksgiving and 
prayer terminated his ministry upon earth. 

From March 30th to April 6th, he sunk still more 
rapidly, and had no longer strength to speak even to 
members of his family ; so that it became necessary to 
countermand the meeting appointed for the latter date. 
God, however, called His servant to Himself on that 
same day before the hour of assembling had arrived. 
Thus was his prayer, so often repeated, granted him : 



14 



PKEFACE. 



" May my life terminate only with my ministry, and 
my ministry only with my life ! " 

It only remains for us to offer some explanation 
upon the subject of the discourses contained in this 
volume. It will be asked how they bave been pre- 
served and reproduced ; for we bave seen tbat not one 
of tbem was ever written out by tbeir autbor. 

From the very beginning, M. Monod's cbildren un- 
clertook to take bis words down from bis lips, and 
wrote tbem out afterward from memory, witb the belp 
of tbeir copious notes. Tbese often comprised every 
word of tbe lecture, wbicb was tben reproduced witb 
great fidelity, and more and more so as tbe cbildren 
became more accustomed to tbeir task. Tbis was, at 
first, even without Monod's knowledge, and always 
witbout any aid on bis part. Tbe only lecture revised 
by bimself is tbe twentietb, " Tbe Holy Scriptures." 
He bad it read to bim twice, and corrected it witb 
considérable care, making important altérations. "We 
may add tbat be was surprised to find bis words so 
accurately taken down. 

Tbe task of compilation was tberefore little more 
tban mere writing, it being only necessary to copy tbe 
notes taken by tbe différent persons, comparing and 
completing tbem, eacb from tbe otber, aided by tbeir 
memory. 



PEEFACE. 



15 



The last lectures were reproduced in tkis way, and 
almost exactly as they were spoken. The earlier ones 
also are given with great h'delity. The first is the only 
one which was written out from memory alone. Those, 
however, who heard it delivered will fînd nothing in 
our version that they will not remember, and will, be- 
sides, recognize the manner of the author ; and through- 
out the entire volume, if we have perhaps not given 
ail Monod's words, we have, at least, given only his 
words and none other ; even if we have noticed any 
slight carelessness of language, or have thought that 
here and there some words or phrases might be want- 
ing to complète or nnite a train of ideas, or better 
elucidate them, we have preferred to leave any such 
slight defect uncorrected, rather than attribute any 
thing to the author which is not his own. 

A few passages have seemed to require some very 
trifling change to make their meaning more clear, but, 
nevertheless, very little altération or correction of any 
sort has been made, and the text, though never penned 
by its author's hand, is very nearly an exact répétition 
of his spoken words. 

Only two or three of the titles of the discourses 
were design ated by Monod himself. The Script are 
texts at the beginning of many of them were, for the 
most part (especially in the case of the later discourses), 



10 



PREFACE. 



selected by biro, and read aloud at bis request before 
be began to speak. 

¥e bave given, also, at tbe conclusion of several 
lectures, prayers, or parts of prayers, wbicb be uttered 
at tbe time. 

Tbe portrait at tbe beginning of tbe volume is by 
a clever artist, frorn a daguerréotype taken in January, 
1856. Ail wbo saw and beard M. Monod at tbese 
Sunday services will appreciate its excellence, and see 
bim tbere precisely as tbey saw bim delivering bis 
lectures. 

"We trust tbat tbis volume may contribute to tbe 
glory of God, and to tbe bastening of His kingdom. 
In tbe beautiful words of St. Paul to tbe Hebrews^ 
" By it be being dead yet speaketb." 

Wbile contemplating a man wbo bas furnisbed us 
witb so strong a testimony to tbe power of Faitb, may 
tbe reader lift bis eyes to ïïim frorn wbom ail grâce, 
excellence, and ail good and perfect works do proceed ! 

" Let us not forget," said Monod, on tbe evening 
of Sunday, Marcb 2d, "to water witb our prayers 
wbat we bave now planted in tbe name of tbe Lord ; 
and let us pray Him tbat no barren curiosity and no 
merely buman affection may take tbe place of a single 
désire to glorify God, eitber in bim wbo speaks or in 
tbose wbo listen." 



PREFACE. 



11 



In the like spirit, we offer this volume to the people 
of God. May they receive it in the same, with the 
jealous désire that to Him be ail the glory, who is the 
giver of ail good ! 

It must be further permitted to us, in presenting 
this book to the public, to glorify the goodness of the 
God of truth, as exhibited in it. 

It is nearly a year since the Church first took alarm 
for the life of Monod, and began to pray to God for 
him, although He had already apparently sealed him 
for eternal life. He was taken away after eight 
months of prayer for him and eight months of suffer- 
ing. And what suffering it was ! But, as he said 
himself, " it was not in vain that he felt himself borne 
upon the hearts and in the pray ers of God's people." 

In taking away his health, his ability to preach, 
and at last his life, God granted his prayers, and those 
of his brethren for him, though in another way. It 
was to exhibit him as an example to ail His people. 
Monod's preaching required the stamp given to it by 
this final and cruel illness. Those who heard him, 
both in his strength and in his weakness, can say 
whether, in ail the vigor of his body and mind, the 
words of the preacher were more efficacious or spoke 
more to the heart, than those of the sick and dying 
Christian man. During his long illness, when God 



18 



PREFACE. 



caused the power of Faith to shine forth so brilliantly 
in him, He permitted him still to speak in His name 
every Sunday. He granted it to him even until the 
last day of his life, and has made this little book to 
spring from his long and bitter suffering, as an humble 
but éloquent testimony to the Gospel. It is perhaps a 
single instance, in the whole history of the Church, 
that a man, at the point of death, expecting, but not 
daring to wish for it, should proclaim, week after week, 
with ever-increasing firmness, patience, peace, and joy, 
the same Gospel doctrines which he had held "and 
preached, and in which he had lived, during the twenty- 
five years of his active ministry. 
To God be ail the glory ! 

In a sermon preached on Christmas-day, 1854, from 
the text, "And a sword shall pierce thy own soul 
also," Monod used a few words which we quote h ère 
to show how entirely God verified in the preacher 
himself the words which He put into his lips. He 
had been showing that the crucified life is the true 
life of the Christian, and in particular of the minister 
of God's Word, and closed his remarks with thèse 
words : 

" And if, among the crosses which He gives you to 
bear, there be one which seems to you — I will not say 
more burdensome than others — but apparently de- 



PREFACE. 



19 



structive of tlie usefulness of your ministry, forever 
ruinous, seemingly, to ail hope of success in your holy 
mission ; if temptation from without be added to temp- 
tation within ; if the blow appears to fall on body, 
soul, and spirit ; if, in fine, ail seems hopelessly lost— 
well, shall I say accept this cross, or rather, thèse many 
crosses ? "Welcome tliem ! welcome tbem with an es- 
pecial spirit of snbmission, of liope, and of fortitnde, as 
afflictions in which, and ont of wliich, the Lord will 
disclose to yon a new mission. "Welcome them, as 
the starting-point of a ministry in bodily weakness and 
bit ter suffering which He has reserved for you as your 
last and best, and which He will make to abonnd in 
fruits unto life, as never did your earlier ministry, in 
the days of your strength and joy gone by ! " 



CONTENT S. 



PAGE 

Préface, ....... 5 

i. all scripture is ideal, namely, its standard is 

neyer less than perfection, 23 

II. — Happy in Life and Happy in Death, . . .30 

III. — On Fréquent Communion, .... 34 

IV. — The Pastor suffering for the Good of the Flock, . 41 
V. — A Few Words on reading the Bible, . 46 

VI. — GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING, . . . .50 

VII. — The Loye of God manifested in His People, . 55 

VIII.— Faith, ....... 60 

IX. — Jésus Christ our Ex ample in Suffering, . . 66 

X. — Sin, . ... . . IS 

XI. — The Cross reyealing to us the Loye of God, . 81 
XII. — The Invisible Things of God, . . . .89 
XILT. — The Man of Sorrows and Men of Sorrows, . 96 

XIV. — The Eegrets of a Dying Man : ... 

1. The Secret of A Holy, Active, and Peaceful Life, 106 

XV. — The Eegrets of a Dying Man : 

2. The Study of the Word of God, . . .118 



22 



CONTENTS. 



PAGB 

XVI. — The Eegrets of a Dying Man : 

3. On the Employaient of Time, . . .124 

XVII. — The Regrets op a Dting Man: 

4. Prayer, . . . . . .133 

XVIII. — The Regrets of a Dying Man: 

5. Over-Interest in the Lesser Concerns of Life, . 143 
XIX>— Jésus Christ, . . . . . 151 

XX. — The Scriptures, . . . . .160 

XXI. — The Holy Spirit, . ... . .172 

XXII. — All in Jésus Christ, . . . . .179 

XXIII. — The Trinity, 187 

XXIV. — The Résurrection, . . . . .195 

XXV. — God is Loye, 201 



I. 



ALL IN SCRIPTURE IS IDEAL, NAMELY, ITS 
STANDARD IS NEYER LESS THAN PER- 
FECTION. 

(October 14, 1855.) 

I am so happy and so grateful, dear friends, be- 
loved brethren and sisters, that I am able to partake 
with you of the body and blood of crar Savionr. That 
flesh is meat indeed, and that blood is drink indeed, to 
those who receive it in faith, by tbe aid of the Holy 
Spirit. 

There is one feature of the Holy Scriptures which 
is of itself snfficient to prove them to be the "Word of 
God : I mean that every thing found there is idéal. 
They contain nothing but the absolute and the perfect. 

Holy Scripture never calls ns to a certain measure 
of holiness by a certain measure of faith, for degree or 
measure of any sort is contrary to the instinct of the 
Bible, because contrary to God. 



24 



ALL IN SCRIPTURE IS IDEAL. 



The idéal of Scripture is not like the idéal of the 
poet, who raises things of earth into the highest 
heaven, but precisely the reverse ; for it regards visi- 
ble things as types only of the invisible — the alone 
real — and sees ail things from the stand-point whence 
God sees them. 

This thought struck me this morning, as I was 
reflecting, before God, upon what I should say to you 
of the Holy Communion, and of the cross of Jésus 
Christ, where alone we can find remission of sin. 

Scripture invariably présents to us sin as idéal. 
JSTone of us can form the faintest idea of the horrible 
sinfulness of sin in the sight of God. "We have always 
lived in an atmosphère so saturated with sin, upon this 
earth which drinks in iniquity like water, and devours 
it like bread, that we are no longer able to see the sin 
that surrounds us in ail directions. 

I will tell you in few words, of my own expérience. 
We find in the Bible thèse words : " For we ourselves 
also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serv- 
ing divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and 
envy, hateful and hating one another." 

For a long while, it seemed impossible for me to 
accept this assertion, for it appeared to me to bear 
marks of manifest exaggeration. I confess that, even 
after it had pleased God, on the day appointed by 



ALL IN SCKIPTTTRE IS IDEAL. 



25 



Him from ail eternity, to turn my heart to Him, it 
was still a long while before I could bring mjself to 
believe it entirely ; and still further, I confess that 
since then, even now this day, I am not able to com- 
prebend it in its fulness, tbougb quite convinced tbat 
it is perfectly true, and that, if I cannot realize it in 
my own expérience, tbe fault is in mjself. Hence I 
baye been brought to see tbe necessitj of a testimony 
préexistent to ourselves, beyond us and above us. 

I accept tbe assertion, therefore, as coming from 
God, because I fmd it in His Word, and I pray Him 
to reveal its meaning to me by His Holy Spirit. A 
slow change of feeling has corne over me, not notice- 
able from year to year — not nearly so rapid, but only 
after a séries of years — and I am now, by the grâce of 
God, able to see this doctrine more clearly, and to feel 
its truth more and more deeply in my own heart. I 
am sure that when this veil of flesh shall be laid aside, 
I shall see and recognize that the words in question 
présent the most faithful delineation, the most truthful 
portrait of my own heart — I mean of my natural heart. 

Let us pray to God to reveal to us our state of sin- 
fulness, without, however, urging Him too far, for He 
knows full well that if we were to advance in this. 
knowledge faster than in the knowledge of His mercy, 
we must fall into despair. 
2 



26 



ALL IN SCRIPTURE IS IDEAL. 



Pardon is also représentée! to us everywhere in 
Scripture as idéal. If onlj a part of onr sins were par- 
doned, if out of a thousand or a million (were it possi- 
ble to nurnber our sins) a single one were unforgiven, 
our pardon would avail us nothing. But our pardon 
is complète. The passage which has just been read to 
you (2 Cor. V. 21) is one of my favorite verses. Jésus 
Christ has not only expiated some of our sins, but has 
expiated sin in its entirety. He has not been regarded 
as a sinner, but has been made sin itself, and — mys- 
tery of mysteries — the curse of God in its full force has 
fallen upon His innocent and holy head. 

In like manner, we are not only just in Him, but 
made Justice itself; so that when God looks upon us 
in Jésus Christ, He sees us even like unto His beloved 
Son Himself, and finds us altogether pleasing and 
attractive in His sight. We who believe, have been 
given by God to Christ as the priée of His sacrifice. 
He can no more break his word to us, than to Jésus 
Himself. He has pledged Himself to us so strongly, 
by ail His glorious excellencies and perfections, that 
this gift of infinité mercy becomes a right in virtue of 
our perfect justice in Jésus Christ. 

The same words of Scripture which show us what 
sin is in the eyes of God, show us at the same time 
how completely and entirely He has obliterated it. 



ALL IN SCRIPTURE IS IDEAL. 



He has " cast our sins behind His back," as if afraid 
of seeing them again. He lias " cast them into the 
depths of the sea ; " " blotted tbem out like a thick 
cloud ; " " scattered tbem like the morning cloud." 
Thus we see what God meant by forgetting sin. He 
is represented as making an effort to forget, and does 
not only forget, but utterly oblitérâtes and annihi- 
lâtes it. 

Lastly, Holy Scripture is idéal in what it teaches 
us of sanctification. "We do not form any adéquate 
idea of what Scripture requires of us, nor of the degree 
of holiness to which we can and ought to attain. 
What fulness in thèse words : " And the very God of 
peace sanctify you wholly ; and I pray God your whole 
spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto 
the coming of our Lord Jésus Christ ; " and to prove 
to us that this is not a mère wish on the part of the 
apostle, he adds immediately : " Faithful is He that 
calleth you, who also will do it." It is no more pos- 
sible for Him to refuse us this grâce than it is to con- 
ceive of His breaking His word. 

And how are we to attain to this holiness ? In 
what respect did those saints of old excel, whose ex- 
amples the Bible holds out to us ? Kot in knowledge, 
not in natural gifts, but in faith. Look at St. James. 
To show us the power of faith and of prayer, he sélects 



28 



ALL IN SCRIPTURE IS IDEAL. 



tlie most wonderful man perhaps of Holy Writ, in the 
most miraculous of His miracles. He sets before us 
tiie boldness of the prayer of Elias as the simplest 
thing in the world, and proposes it as an example to 
the humblest and most insignificant of us, to show us 
what can be effected by persevering, earnest prayer, 
" the fervent prayer of the righteous man " (literally, 
the energumenic or fanatical prayer). 

Oh ! if we could feel in our hearts, each one of us, 
from this day forth, the enormity of sin, the fulness 
and completeness of its pardon, and the power of the 
holiness to which we ought to attain, what a change 
would corne over our lives, and what salutary influ- 
ence might we exercise upon the whole Church ! 

PRAYER. 

O God ! Thou who knowest ail the misery and 
suffering that sin has brought upon this misérable 
world and its wretched inhabitants ; Thou who seest 
ail the cruel sufferiug endured at this moment, 1 the 
sight of which we could not bear, we commend to 
Thee ail the atnicted and distressed, that Thou would- 
est be pleased to pour out upon them the treasures of 
Thy grâce and consolation. We cannot name them 

1 Referring to the war then raging in the Crimea. 



ALL IN SCRIPTUKE IS IDEAL. 



29 



ail to Thee, but Thou canst name them to Thyself. 
¥e commend to Thee ail victims of war, ail families 
in sorrow and mourning, and ail others now living in 
anxiety and distress. We commend to Thee ail the 
oppressed and persecuted for righteousness' sake. 
We commend to Thee ail slaves. Look npon the thou- 
sands and millions of slaves under the yoke of men 
who profess Thy name„ " servants of Christ " who are 
not servants. We commend the poor to Thee — ah ! the 
poor ! — and the sick, especially the poor sick. "We 
commend to Thee ail who know Thee, that it may 
please Thee to support them, and send down upon 
them Thy peace and Thy comfort. And we commend 
also to Thy grâce those who do not know Thee, that 
it may please Thee to reveal Thyself to them, for, if 
they have not Thee, they have no alternative than 
despair. 

I, who am suffering somewhat, acknowledge and 
confess Christ and His peace. I thank Thee for the 
joy which Thou pourest into my soul. Thou wilt 
perhaps call upon us to part from each other for a 
short time, but what matter ? We know that, by Thy 
grâce, we shall one day be reunited at Thy side ! . . . 



n. 



HAPPY IN LIFE AND HAPPY IN DEATH. 

(October 21, 1855.) 

Philippians I. 19-26. — "For I know that this shall turn to my salva- 
tion through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jésus Christ, 
according to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall 
be ashamed, but that with ail boldness, as always, so now also Christ 
shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death. For 
to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. But if I live in the fiesh, this 
is the fruit of my labor : yet what I shall choose I wot not. For I am in 
a strait betwixt two, having a désire to départ, and to be with Christ ; 
which is far better : Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful 
for you. And having this confidence, I know that I shall abide and con- 
tinue with you ail for your furtherance and joy of faith ; that your 
rejoicing may be more abundant in Jésus Christ for me by my coming to 
you a gain." 

I désire, my dear friends, to call your attention to 
the holy apostle's view of Life and of Death. Re- 
mark, in the first place, the words which for m his 
starting-point, and, as it were, the motto of his Chris- 
tian life : " For to me to live is Christ, and to die is 



HAPPY IN LIFE AND HAPPY IN DEATH. 31 

gain " (a literal translation) ; that is, my life, my nat- 
nral life which I am living to-day, and may lose to- 
morrow, is employed in no other way than in follow- 
ing and serving Jésus Christ. 

The words u to die is gain " require some explana- 
tion. The apostle is asking himself whether it would 
be better for him to live or to die. The question has 
often presented itself to us, and we may have answered 
it even as the apostle did; but, it is greatly to be 
feared, in a very différent spirit. When we have de- 
sired death, it has been — " I do not know whether I 
am more in dread of the afflictions of this life, from 
which death will relieve me, or of the terrors of death, 
from which life will préserve me : " or, in other words, 
life and death seem to us to be two evils of wkich it is 
difficult to détermine which is the less. 

The apostle, on the other hand, regards them as 
two immense blessings, and does not know which is 
the greater. Personally, he would prefer to die, that 
he might be with Christ. For the sake of the world, 
he would prefer to live, to serve Jésus Christ, to in- 
crease ïïis kingdom, and to win soûls for Him. This 
is the true view of life and death, beautiful because 
based upon and hallowed by love. It is the view 
taken by our Saviour Jésus Christ Himself. 

Let us try and appreciate this feeling. Life is a 



32 HAPPY IN LIFE AND HAPPY IN DEATH. 

blessing, and death is also a blessing. Death sets us 
free from the miseries of tins life, and, even though life 
may have been fui] for us of ail tlie joys that earth can 
give, death gives us access to a joy and a glory of 
which we can form no adéquate idea. 

¥e ought, then, to look upon death as désirable in 
itself, and should not shrink from any thiug which 
tends to keep it in our minds. Ail illnesses, ail in 
stances of sudden death, ail that passes around us, 
should remind us that it may corne to any one of us at 
any moment. 

Life is also good and désirable, because it enables 
i us to serve our Lord Jésus Christ, to glorify and to 
imitate Him. It is not worth while to live for any 
thing efee. Our strength, our breath, life, faculties, 
ail that we possess, ought to be devoted, consecrated, 
sanctified, crucified, for the service of our Lord. The 
crucified life is the truly happy life, even in the bitter 
est earthly suffering, for in it we can both enjoy and 
shed abroad the most precious blessings. Let us love 
and value life, then, that we may fi.ll it with Jésus 
Christ. To attain to this feeling, however, we must be 
transformed into new créatures by the Holy Spirit 
alone. Remember, it is not only that our own spirit 
must be supported, consoled, and strengthened, but the 
Spirit of God Him self must corne and dwell in us. 



HAPPY IN LIFE AND HAPPY IN DE AT H. 33 

We are often diligent in labor to cnltivate and adorn 
our own minds and spirits, and it is rigbt and proper 
that we should be so, but it is not enougb. We must 
bave more. We must bave Jésus Christ Himself 
dwelling in our bearts bj His Holy Spirit. 

Ab ! my friends, if we reflect upon tbe promises of 
tbe Gospel, we sball find bow far, bow very far we are 
from possessing and enjoying tbem. May it please 
God to unveil tbe beaven aboyé us, to reveal ail to us, 
to fill us witb ail wisdom and knowledge, and sbow us 
tbat even bere on eartb we can attain unto a perfect 
joy in anticipation of tbe fulness of bappiness and of 
victory wbicb is in store for us ! May He make us 
accept and enjoy tbe blessings wbicb He deligbts to 
shower down upon us, if we will receive and accept 
tbem! May He sbow us, and make us feel, tbat if 
eartb bas tbe power to crush and trouble and oppress 
us, it has no power to affect tbe gracions qualities of 
Heaven, to bring to naugbt tbe promises of God, nor 
to cast a yeil, no, not even tbe slightest sbadow, upon 
the love witb wbicb God, our Fatber, loves us in Jésus 
Cbrist ! 



III. 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 

(October 28, 1855.) 

My dear friends, I wish you to know that during 
my illness I have received the communion very fre- 
quently, finding mueli comfort, and, I trust, much bene- 
fit from it. 

It is a great evil that the communion should be so 
rarely celebrated in our Church, but an evil which 
efforts on ail sides are being made to remedy. Our 
reformers, in bringing about this state of things, took 
especial care to explain that it was only a temporary 
arrangement, made to correct serions abuses which had 
crept into the primitive Church. But what they in- 
tended to last only for a limited time, has continued 
for centuries in the greater part of our churches. ¥e 
* are at last approaching the time when fréquent com- 
munion will be restored to us. 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 



35 



Calvin has said somewhere, that tlie communion 
ought to be celebrated at least every Sunday. Kemark 
this u at leastP If every Sunday be at least, what 
would be at most f At most would be to take it as 
the first Christians did, according to Calvin (and this 
is a clear inference from the Acts of the Apostles), 
every day ? from bouse to house, after tbe family 
meal. 1 

You must ail have remarked tbat rare communion 
gives a strange and extraordinary idea — I bardly 
know what — of the communion itself, of the prépara- 
tion which ought to précède and of the émotions which 
follow it. There is reason, too, to believe that rare 
communion has given rise to most of the controversies 
on the subject. Fréquent communion, on the other 
hand, enables us to understand the true nature of the 
Sacrament much more clearly, and it is impossible 
that daily communion should fail to make it entirely 
plain to us. It would teach us to look upon it as one 
of the simplest acts of our Christian life, in the same 

1 Commentators differ from this view of the meaning of /car' oIkov, 
translatée! " from house to house." 

Wordsworth, Bishop of Lincoln, says : /car' oIkou, at home, or in the 
house or room to which they habitually resorted for worship .... per- 
haps — probably — in their ovrn upper room, where the Holy Ghost de- 
scended on the church upon the day of Pentecost. 

The bishop 'quotes St. Cyril, Bishop of Jérusalem, in confirmation of 
this view. — [Translatons Note. 



36 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 



way that onr daily meals are among the siniplest acts 
of our ordinary life. 

However this may be, the Holy Communion will 
be of tlie largest profit to us, if we look upon it as the 
most simple expression of our faith ; in this way we 
shall dérive the highest benefit from it, and it will 
feed our soûls with the body and blood of our Lord 
Jésus Christ. 

The words of our confession of faith upon this sub- 
ject are so beautiful, that I must quote them to you. 
They comprise ail I could wish to say : 

" We confess that the Holy Supper is a pledge of 
our union with Jésus Christ ; that He has not only 
died and risen again for us, but that He really feeds 
and nourishes us with His body and blood, that we 
may be one with Him, and that His life may be our 
life. Although He is in heaven until He shall ç,ome 
to judge the world, we believe, nevertheless, that, by 
the secret and incompréhensible virtue of His Spirit, 
He nourishes and quickens us with the substance of 
His body and blood. We hold indeed that this is done 
in a spiritual manner, not desiring to substitute thought 
or imagination for effect and reality, but acknowledg- 
ing that the mystery transcends in its depth the limits 
of our sensés, and of the whole order of ^Nature. We 
believe that as in the Holy Supper, so also in Baptism, 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 



37 



God does give us really and in fact what is figured in 
each, and we unité therefore with the visible signs, the 
true possession and enjoyment of what is presented to 
us in them. Thus ail who bring to the Holy Table of 
Christ a pure faith as a vessel receive truly what the 
outward signs signify ; that is, that the body and 
blood of our Lord J esus Christ serve no less as food 
and drink to the soul, than the bread and wine to the 
body. The bread and wine given us in the Holy Sup- 
per form really our spiritual nourishment, showing us, 
as if to our eyes, that the flesh of Jésus Christ is our 
food, and His blood our drink." 

To this admirable quotation I will only add that 
the pastor, M. Verny, having read it one day to some 
Lutheran friends, who were discussing the subject of 
the Holy Communion with him, they said, " This is 
the exact expression of our faith ; " to which M. Yerny 
replied that the passage was taken from the confession 
of faith of the reformed churches ; a proof that, in ad 
hering exactly to Scripture, as in this case, the field of 
controversy is won by faith and charity. 

Well, my friends, by the Communion which we 
have just celebrated, we bear our testimony to the fact 
that the flesh and blood of the Saviour are " meat and 
drink indeed," and that the whole Christian ambition 
of our soûls is, that we may be nourished by them day 



88 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 



and night, and that we are to seek ail our strength 
in a real, profound, living Communion with Jésus 
Christ. 

It is by prayer that we can main tain ourselves in 
this Communion with Hirn, who will render us capa- 
ble of doing what He has done, and of being what He 
has been. But it must be the prayer of faith, ardent, 
persevering, and accepting no refusai, desiring to 
receive and enjoy ail that the Father has promised in 
His Word — never-ceasing prayer, which keeps the 
knees bent, and pursues its task through tears and 
blood until it has obtained what it has asked. 

Oh, what strength we should have, and what joy 
unchangeable, independent of ail the sufferings of this 
wretched body — a body perhaps already maimed and 
half ruined, but the temple of the Holy Spirit now, and 
to-morrow to be transformed into a glorious, spiritual 
body, filled with the Holy Ghost like the body of 
Jésus Christ Himself ! "What joy would be ours, I do 
not say if we had the means, for we have them, but if 
we used the means we have, of subduing the pains and 
connicts of the flesh, and of reaching the heart of our 
Father, the joy of our Saviour, and the power of the 
Holy Spirit ! 

Meditate, I entreat you, upon the Holy Spirit. 
Kead and read again the words of J esus Christ in the 



ON FREQUENT COMMUNION. 



39 



last chapters of St. John, the eightli and remaining 
chapters of the Romans, and learn what power of 
strength and consolation we have in the Holy Spirit, 
none less than God Himself. 

Yea, Thyself, O God ! who hast corne to dwell 
in the body of Thy poor, sinftil, misérable child, ruined 
by sin and suffering, but saved by grâce, and washed 
in the biood of the Lamb without spot ! — Having such 
precious promises, why should we allow ourselves to 
stop half-way ? "Why should we groan in hunger and 
thirst, when we have a table before us, so bountifully 
spread ? We need only reach forth the hand of faith 
to be fed even to perfect satiety and to receive abun- 
dant life. 

Ah ! if this little handful of Christians here could 
résolve to be thoroughly and entirely happy ; to pray 
as Elias did — really pray ; if they would détermine to 
conquer their natural cowardice, spiritual indolence, 
and unbelief — what could we not accomplish if we 
went about the world like the twelve apostles ! "We 
should rouse ail Paris, winning and drawing with us 
ail our brethren and sisters moved at seeing the Gos- 
pel realized in our lives ! 

Oh my God ! our deepest misery is, that having 
so great and precious promises, we do so little. Corne 
and help us ! and grant that the little Communion in 



40 



ON FKEQUENT COMMUNION. 



this upper room may be for ail who hâve partaken of 
it, or Lave been présent at it, the gerni of a new Chris- 
tian life for this world and the next ; that we may be 
so conformed to our Saviour Jésus Christ, that we may 
live as He lived ; and even as He has said, " He who 
hath seen me hath seen the Father," so may we say, 
he who hath seen me hath seen my Master ! 

Pour down this blessing upon the friends who con- 
sole me in my affliction — my so happy affliction ! 



IV. 



THE PASTOR SUFFERING FOR THE GOOD OF 
THE FLOCK. 

(November 4, 1855.) 

How gracions is God, to give us, in the Holy Com- 
munion, so simple and at the same time so profound 
an image of the invisible grâce of onr Lord ! 

If we receive the teachings of Scripture npon the 
subject, we shall recognize that the whole basis of the 
Gospel is npon that table, for we find there two things : 
first, Jésus Christ djing for us, and His death, His 
blood, His expiatory sacrifice, our only hope of safety, 
accomplishing absolutely every thing for the elect of 
God ; and, again, we find Jésus dead, who enters into 
us, and nourishes us, who gives us life by His body and 
blood, and makes us partabers of His nature, even as 
He Himself is partaker of the nature of the Father. 

To die to oursel^es, to live to Jésus Christ, by the 



42 



THE PASTOR SUFFERING 



Holy Spirit, Jésus Christ having died for us upon the 
cross — this is the whole Gospel, ail our faith, aud ail 
our Christian life. 

I wish to add a few words, not as a matter personal 
to myself, but in the spirit of St. Paul, when he said, 
" I désire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you." 
Far be it from me, assuredly, to compare with his 
great sufferings, so directly in and for God's service, 
the trials with which it has pleased Him to favor me. 
But I désire, by the spirit in which I accept them, to 
convert them into an affliction borne for the Gospel, 
and, in a very humble measure, also for you. I désire 
that none of you be cast down. Perhaps some of my 
good friends are troubled and anxious at the thought 
of my sufferings. Do not be so ! Give me this proof of 
your brotherly love, not to be troubled, but ouly prof- 
itably moved and awakened by them. Not that I do 
not suffer, nor that suffering is not grievous to me. I 
am no Stoic, but by the grâce of God a Christian, and 
am not ashamed to say that there are moments when 
I cry aloud with tears far more than I pray. I 
remember that my Saviour " cried with a loud voice," 
with tears. But, although painful to the flesh, thèse 
afflictions are attended with so great blessings, that a 
sentiment of gratitude ought to predominate both in 
my heart and yours. 



FOR THE GOOD OF THE FLOCK. 



43 



What a favor to me, dear friends, that God, in 
choosing one of us to remind the others of the lessons 
of life, of death, of sin, pardon, and sanctification, 
should hâve deigned to select me ! What a privilège 
that, in choosing me, He has spared my brethren, and 
that He has chosen me to give you thèse lessons of 
eternal life ! Think, too, how ail that has befallen me 
is calcnlated to make me appreciate a Christian death, 
at whatever moment it may corne to me. Let us not 
seek for any thing else than to glorify God. If it 
please Him to heal me, I pray Him that it may be for 
His glory ; if it please Him to take me, I shall be hap- 
py to be received into His bosom. I cannot tell which 
would be better for me or for the Church, and leave 
myself entirely in His hands. 

What a favor, too, to h ave been chosen to be thus 
matured by suffering ! You have cause, then, to rejoice 
on my account. For yourselves, too, has not my afflic- 
tion been instrumental in leading your thoughts to 
dwell upon death, eternity, and the truths of the Gos- 
pel 1 Has not the brotherly love, which unités us, 
induced you to pray ? I feel that the people of God 
remember me in their prayers, and am filled with joy 
and penetrated with gratitude. 

Well, is not this a great blessing to you ? and do 
you not feel that ail that has happened to me is cal- 



44 



THE PASTOR SUFEERING 



culated to bring about in the more intimate circle of 
my friends, especially in my family, a spirit of peace 
and serenity, and that our house is in some small de- 
gree less imperfect than it bas been hitherto, a bonse 
of prayer, where tbe name of God is constantly in- 
voked ? "We bave, then, many blessings to be thankfhl 
for. 

Understand, also, wbat deligbt I have in tbe 
thought tbat I am afflicted for your good; becanse 
notbing else can bring my sufferings so near to tbose 
of my Saviour. I say, then, in tbe spirit of tbe same 
St. Paul wbom I bave already quoted, " I rejoice in 
my sufferings for y ou, and fill up tbat wbicb is bebind 
of tbe afflictions of Christ in my flesb, for His body's 
sake, wbicb is tbe Cburcb." 

Ob, tbe wonder of God's peace ! Oh, tbe power 
of tbe Gospel ! ob, tbe bitterness of sin ! ob, tbe im- 
mutable certainty of pardon ! Let us battle against 
sin, my friends — it is tbe only evil, the only evil ! 

Now that I find myself face to face witb sin, called 
upon to pass in review, before God, ail tbe sins of my 
past life, and to crave His pardon for them, I feel how 
terrible tbe struggle is, and how deeply sin is rooted 
in us. How absurd and foolish it would be in us to 
complain of tbe trials wbicb God sends us, since thèse 
very trials are not even enough to uproot our wretcbed 



FOR THE GOOD OF THE FLOCK. 



45 



pride, our frightful selfishness, and, above ail, our dé- 
testable unbelief ! 

May the peace of God be with us ! Let us put 
aside ail personal sentiments. Do not look upon me 
as father or friend, or at ail events do so only in a very 
limited degree— look upon me, above ail, as the min- 
ister of Jésus Christ, and pray God that, until my last 
breath, I may be faithful in my ministry. Do not 
look at the man in me, but contemplate the work 
which God desires to accomplish, both in me and in 
y ou. 

Let us take courage. Let us pray God to fill us 
with His Spirit, to enable us to subdue the flesh by 
the Spirit, until, by -taking us to Himself, He shall de- 
liver us from ail evil. Let us pray that, in a spiritual 
body and with sanctified soul, He may give us to taste, 
in Jésus Christ, of the joy, the pleasures, and the glory 
purchased and obtained for us alone, by His blood shed 
for us ! 



V. 



A FEW WORDS ON READIXG THE BIBLE. 

(November 11, 1855.) 

On thèse occasions I am in the habit of addressing 
a few words of Christian exhortation to the friends 
who are good enough to corne to me. To-day, how- 
ever, my suffering deprives me of this consolation, and 
I must limit myself to telling you a fact in my Chris- 
tian expérience which may perhaps lead you to whole- 
some reflection upon the value of God's Word. I will 
relate to you with the greatest simplicity what hap- 
pened to me last week. 

One night, during which I had suffered very much, 
and slept very little, I composed myself upon my bed, 
toward the end of the night, about half-past four in the 
morning, in the hope of getting a little sleep. I asked 
the person who was sitting up with me (one of those 



A FEW WORDS ON READING THE BIBLE. 47 

good young inen 1 who are so kind as to dévote a part 
of their strength and time for my benefit) to read rne a 
cliapter of the Word of God. 

He proposed to read me the eighth cliapter of the 
Epistle to the Romans. I assented, and begged him 
to go back to the sixth, and even to the fifth chapter, 
that we might have the whole train of thought. ¥e 
read the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth chapters con- 
seeutively, and my attention, interest, and admiration, 
were so vividly enlisted by the heavenly language of 
St. Paul (or, I should rather say, of the ïïoly Spirit, 
speaking by St. Panl), that ail thonght of sleep left me. 

We read the ninth and ail the following chapters 
to the end, with nnabated interest, and then the fonr 
first, in order to complète the whole Epistle. 

Two hours were passed in this way, during which 
I thonght only of listening to the Word of God, and of 
profiting by it, and then the Lord, in His goodness, 
granted me the repose of which I stood in need. 

I cannot tell you how, in thns reading the Epistle 
to the Romans in its entirety, I was struck by the 
stamp of divinity, of truth, of holiness, of charity, and 
of power, which is imprinted on each page, and on 

1 During more than six months, a few young friends, nearly ail médi- 
cal students, sat up in turn with Monod every night. Their affectionate 
and devoted care and attention alleviated many a long hour of sleepless- 
ness and pain. 



48 A FEW WOEDS ON READING THE BIBLE. 

each word. My young friend and I both felt (without 
having at first communicated our thoughts to each 
other) that we were listening to a voice from heaven, 
and that, independently of ail the évidences which 
attest the inspiration and Divine authority of Holy 
Scripture, the internai testimony which it renders to 
itself is abundantly sufficient ; even as Jésus Christ 
bore testimony to Himself by His works. 

We felt also how useful it is to read Scripture in 
its entirety, and how much we lose in taking only por- 
tions, fragments, or detached verses, at a time. We 
can only understand a book by reading it, now and 
then, directly through. 

We were taught that there are two ways in which 
we ought to study God's Word : the one, to read a 
book from the beginning to the end at once, to pro- 
duce the impression now made upon us ; and the other, 
to study each verse and word in détail. 

Our strongest impression, however, was a feeling 
of humiliation. We said to each other, " Is it possi- 
ble that, possessing such treasures, we neglect to avail 
ourselves of them ! " 

It seemed to us as though we had passed two hours 
in heaven. We were not only transported into the 
society of the best of m en, of the privileged and in- 
spired organs of the Holy Ghost, but felt ourselves 



A FEW WORDS ON READING THE BIBLE. 49 

amid the elect angels, and in company witli Jésus 
Christ Himself. 

¥e determined, submitting our resolution to the 
care of Him who alone can protect the résolves of His 
children, to dévote ourselves with new ardor to the 
studj of the Scriptures, and, to this end, to give up, if 
need be, any amount of other reading, however useful 
and instructive, as not comparable with the Word of 
God. We resolved to live with His Word, even as we 
désire to live with. God Himself; for, reading thèse 
words, inspired by the Holy Spirit of God, is really like 
a conversation with God. 

I recommend to you, my dear friends, the constant 
study of the Word of God, and earnest and profound 
méditation upon it. It will raise us above ail else. 
It will prove the strength of our life, the joy of our 
heart, and our powerful and effectuai consolation, both 
in life and in death, through J esus Christ. 

I pray for it for you, as well as for myself. Amen. 
3 



VL 



GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING. 

(November 18, 1855.) 

The prayer which we hâve just heard from our 
brother's lips was full of the thought, that it is our 
duty, each one of us, according to his position, to glo- 
rify God. 

I should like, in a few words, to be able to make you 
feel, and to feel myself, what an immense privilège it 
is to be called upon to glorify God. Think what it is ! 
God, the sovereign Creator, the one author of ail 
things, by whose will ail is and was created ; God, the 
alone Saviour of lost and guilty humanity, and the 
only consolation of suffering mortals ; God, from whom 
ail good doth proceed, who has no sort of need of us, 
invites us to add something to His glory in bearing 
our testimony to Him before His créatures ; contrib- 
uting thus our part to the sanctification of His name. 



GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING. 



51 



Ile desires that this sliall be the one suprême law of 
our life. 

True piety, as well as true wisdom and philosophy 
(even huraan philosophy), demands a single governing 
principle for the direction of our entire life, upon 
which we may base ail our actions. This single prin- 
ciple, which some seek in the world, others in them- 
selves or in a god of their own imagining, we find in 
the living and true God ; the alone Holy, alone Wise, 
alone Eternal ; upon whom alone dépends not only 
our eternal happiness, but also the smallest comfort we 
can enjoy day by day from the émotions of our heart, 
or even from the sensations of our poor body. 

Who are they whom He calls to contribute to His 
glory ? He calls the angels ; and happy are they, for 
they feel how great is their privilège. But not the 
angels alone. He calls us, too, misérable sinners who 
deserve His anger, and whom our evil deeds bring 
under His curse. He not only takes us by the hand 
and draws us up out of the bottomless abyss into which 
our sins h ave cast us, but as He rai ses us He says, 
" Now glorify Me ! " as if we could render any thing to 
Him from whom we have received ail, beginning with 
the pardon of our sins ! 

Ah ! if we could only feel what a favor God be- 
stows upon us by employing us to add something to 



52 GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING. 

His glory, we should occupy curselves with this alone. 
We should find in it, my dear friends, the sweetest 
and the deepest consolation that we can enjoy ; for it 
is not pardoned sinners alone who are thns called upon 
to glorify God, after having been saved by Hini, but 
also wretched, snffering sinners, dragging out tlieir 
lives miserably in afflictions of sonl and body. It 
would seem that such as thèse would be excluded from 
the privilège of glorifying God, absorbed as they are 
by the pains and sorrows of life. Ah ! not at ail. 
Thèse are they who are most of ail called upon to 
glorify Him, and they find in their snffering, as they 
found in their sins forgiven, new cause and motive for 
giving glory to Him who has taught us to say, " When 
I am weak, then I am strong." What a consolation 
for those who suffer to be able to say : " By my suffer- 
ings, borne patiently and peacefully (if I am not able 
to bear them joyously, and glory in them), I can ren- 
der glory to God as I could not in any other manner ! " 
What infinité sweetness do sufferers find in this reflec- 
tion ! Thus it is that affliction becomes a pri^lege ; 
for to suffer is a privilège to the Christian, and, to 
suffer much, an especial privilège. Ail who suffer 
ought to enter into my thought, " and commit the 
keeping of their soûls to Him in well-doing as unto a 
faithful Creator." 



GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING. • 53 

¥e cannot, al as ! do it of ourselves. " The spirit is 
willing, but tlie flesh is weak." The moment after we 
have been raised as it were to heaven by the simple 
words of the Gospel, our misérable flesh drags us down, 
takes us bj the feet, brings us back to earth, and chains 
us there by the weight of suffering. My friends, this is 
our whole life's struggle, the battle of life and the bat- 
tle of death. 

But we have Jésus with us, the author and finisher 
of our faith, who lias Himself been made perfect 
through suffering, and is therefore all-powerful to suc- 
cor those who are tempted. Let our constant prayer 
be, " Lord, increase our faith ! " " I believe, Lord, help 
Thou mine unbelief ! " 

Oh ! dear friends, who in y our brotherly kindness 
have corne to unité with me in celebrating this sweet 
Communion — the living image of our communion with 
God and with each other — may God bless each one of 
you, may He give y ou the grâce to live for His glory 
alone, to suffer only for His glory, and to speak alone 
for His glory, until it be granted you to die for His 
glory, in Jésus Christ crucified and risen again ! 

PRAYER. 

Oh, my God, send down Thy grâce in Jésus Christ 
upon each one of us with infinité liberality. Grant us 



54 



GOD GLORIFIED IN SUFFERING. 



the grâce to live in Thy Communion and to glorify 
Thee, that Thy will may be done upon this poor earth 
as it is done in heaven, througli Jésus Christ our Lord ! 

Look with pity upon this world for which Jésus 
died, plnnged as it still is in darkness, misery, pollu- 
tion, and crime. Look with pity upon Thy Church 
which Thou hast chosen out of the world, and which 
has turned away from Thy holy designs and taken 
rather the semblance of the world, even while calling 
itself Thy Church. 

Look upon us and upon ail Thy children. Look 
upon ail who suffer. ¥e commend to Thy protection 
the numerous and touching family of the afflicted, 
the sick, prison ers, slaves, the persecuted, especially 
those for righteousness' sake, and the oppressed of ail 
kinds. Teach them to look upon Thee with the eyes 
of faith. Hasten the coming of the kingdom of Jésus 
Christ. May He corne, and may we then see and 
know ail that Thou hast done for us in sending Him 
into the world ! Amen. 



VIL 



THE LOVE OF GOD MANIFESTED IN HIS 
PEOPLE. 

(November 25, 1855.) 

Ovekcome by pain and fatigue, I feared, dear 
friends, that I might not be able to address y on to-day, 
but the Lord grants me the favor to do so still, having 
vouchsafed me some relief from suffering. Yon will 
understand how grateful I am to Him for giving me 
the power (which no human foresiglit would hâve an- 
ticipated) to continue this service in some measure 
every Sunday, for I désire to persévère in my humble 
ministry until my last breath. It is my life, and I 
feel that, when I am no longer able to exercise it here, 
it will be that I shall be called upon to exercise an- 
other and a better elsewhere. 

Pray to God that He will not withdraw from me 
the consolation of receiving, each Sunday, the body 



THE LOYE OF GOD 



and blood of my Saviour, to strengthen my body 
and sonl in Him, and that I may also be able to 
say a few words of édification and exhortation to my 
brethren. 

Last Sunday, I insisted, briefly, upon our immense 
privilège in being able to glorify God, wliich we are 
not only permitted, but commanded to do. I will add 
to-day that there is a point of view in which we are 
especially called upon, and in which we are especially 
happy in being able to glorify Him. 

If, among God's perfections, which we are called 
upon to exhibit before men, there be one whose mani- 
festation is His especial pleasure, should we not most 
of ail glorify Him by imitating and showing forth in 
ourselves this particular perfection? "Well, what is 
the especial attribute in which He most of ail delights 
to manifest Himself? Is it not love? Is it not writ- 
ten, " God is love ? " God is also just, but we do not 
find it written that God is justice. God is powerful, 
but still it is not written, God is power. 

There are, however, two of His perfections to which 
this especial honor is rendered by the beloved apostle 
leaning upon His Saviour's breast : holiness and love. 
" God is love," " God is light ; " and while in his first 
Epistle he says once " God is light," he says twice, 
within the interval of a few verses, " God is love ; " as 



MANIFESTED IN HIS PEOPLE. 



57 



if to lay more stress upon the latter attribute tlian 
upon the former. 

If this be tlie case, dear friends, tlie waj in wliich 
we shall glorify God is to show forth in ourselves the 
love that is in Him, so that in looking upon our man- 
ner of life, in hearing us speak, in observing our ac- 
tionSj our suffering, our living, and our dying, ail men 
may admire, not us, but the love of God which is in us. 

How can we exhibit the love of God ? Jésus Christ 
has shown it to us. Beyond ail else Hemade manifest 
this love. He glorified God before ail the world, and 
tenderly constrained ail who looked upon Him with 
faith to say when they saw Him, " What fulness of love 
is there in God ! — because the same who has told us 
that 6 he who hath seen Me hath seen the Father,' is 
Himself so full of love ! " And how did He show it ? 
In every way. Chiefly in suffering for His brethren ; 
• firstj for their temporal relief, " He went about doing 
good." The cures which He performed were, however, 
only the type and image of the true spiritual deliver- 
ance which was His mission. In suffering to secure 
to us our spiritual deliverance, He above ail exhibited 
His love, and this is the highest conception that we 
can form of the manifestation of the love of God, 
narnely, to suffer for our brethren, especially for the 
good of their soûls. 



58 



THE LOVE OF GOD 



We can ail do the same thing, my dear friends. 
Not ail in tlie direct arid especial manner of tlie Apos- 
tle Paul, for his whole life was consecrated to preach- 
ing the Gospel ; as lie said, " I fill up tliat which is 
behind of the afflictions of Christ, in my flesh for 
His body's sake, which is the Church." We need not 
seek any very exact and précise explanation of thèse 
words. There is an infinité charity and depth of love 
in them which cannot be rendered by any hnman défi- 
nitions. The necessity of imitating his Saviour was 
the feeling which pervaded his whole life, " Leaving 
us an example that ye should follow His steps ; " as his 
Saviour suffered for men to save them, St. Paul felt the 
need of suffering for his brethren — not to save them — 
for none have declared more explicitly than he the 
utter powerlessness of man or of créature to save — but 
to labor for their salvation, " for, in doing this, thou 
shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee." 

But even if we do not, like St. Paul, suffer directly 
for the service of God and the good of mankind, there 
is no suffering which we endure to which we cannot 
communicate a like character by the spirit in which we 
bear it. " Let them that suffer according to the w T ill 
of God commit the keeping of their soûls to Him in 
well-doing as unto a faithful Creator." 

If we study to turn ail tlie afflictions which it may 



MANIFESTED IN HIS PEOPLE. 



59 



please God to send us, whether of spirit, soul, or body, 
to the good of mankind, to their temporal, but espe- 
cially their spiritual good, we shall have reaelied the 
end for which God visited us with them. 

As a gênerai rule, my beloved friends, the more we 
love, the more we advance in spiritual communion 
with God and with each other, the more we shall grow 
to be like Him. 

Let us, then, each one of us, show ourselves in the 
world as a reflection, as it were, of the divine Love. 
Let ail our words and works, our most secret thoughts 
and prayers, breathe that love which God has revealed 
to us in Jésus Christ, so that men be forced to say, 
" God is love indeed ! " 



i 



vm. 

FAITH. 

(October 2, 1855.) 

Hebrews x. 32-39 : " But call to renienibrance tbe former days, in 
wbicb, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions ; 
partir, wbilst ye were made a gazhig-stock botb by reproacbes and afflic- 
tions ; and partir, wbilst ye became companions of tbeni tbat "vrere so 
used. For ye bad compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfullr tbe 
spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselres tbat ye bare in bearen a 
better and an enduring substance. Cast not away tberefore your confi- 
dence, wbicb hatb great recompense of revrard. For ye bare need of pa- 
tience, tbat, after ye bare done tbe will of God, ye migbt receire tbe 
promise. For yet a little wbile, and He tbat sball corne will corne, and 
will not tarry. Now tbe just sball lire by faitb : but if any man draw 
back, my soul sball bare no pleasure in bim. But we are not of tbem 
wbo draw back unto perdition ; but of tbem tbat beliere to tbe saring of 
tbe soul." 

Faith, tbe subject of tbe verses just read to us aud 
of tbe admirable cbapter folio wing ; faitb, of wbicb 
tbe Sacrauient of tbeLord's Supper is au image at once 
so simple aud so profouud; tbis faitb, my friends, is 
our ouly power, aud our only peace. It is notbing 



FAITE. 



61 



less tlian the power of God placed at the disposai of 
man. In the eleventh chapter, St. Paul surns up in 
faith alone ail gifts, not only of sanctification, but of 
prophecy and of miracles. He does not say that Moses 
was enabled to pass through tne Red Sea because 
endued with supernatural power, but he say s it was 
because he believed. He does not say that it was 
supernatural power which enabled Abraham to do the 
mighty things which he did, but he says it was be- 
cause he believed. 

Hence we note, with admiration, that the Holy 
Spirit explains ail the mighty works of the saints by 
an interior and entirely spiritual principle ; and, further ? 
by a principle accessible to ail. 

If, then, even in the case of Moses and Abraham, 
faith alone is brought to our notice, we see that each 
one of us, by the same faith, may be rendered capable 
of performing the work placed before us by God, even 
as they performed the works which God gave them to 
do. 

Works vary ; but the principle upon which God 
accomplishes them in each individual is the same : it is 
one, it is divine, it is all-powerful. 

Let us not be astonished at this. At the first blush 
it does seem very astonishing that the simple fact of 
God's hearing and answering our prayer can accom- 



62 



FAITH. 



plisli such marvels, and, in truth, the will of God, real- 
ized in the huinblest Christian, is no less a wonder 
than the passage of the Red Sea, or any other miracle 
which has been performed. 

After a moment's reflection, however, we can con> 
prehend the power of faith from its nature. What a 
marvel it is that we — y ou and I — placed in the midst 
of tins sin-steeped world, appealed to by the testimony 
of our eyes, our sensés, our own will, by examples, and, 
in fine, by the évidence of ail our organs — what a mar- 
vel that we are able to give the lie to ail this évidence, 
and able, against hope ; against expérience, against the 
irrésistible testimony of our own sight, to believe a 
single word, one little word that God has told us ! 
You remember Luther's line : "Eir Wortlein kann ihn 
fàllen" (one little word can make him fall). If this 
little word of God, penetrating into our hearts, be 
faith, then it is not astonishing that faith should be 
alhpowerful, because it is not astonishing that God 
should do ail that He wills to do. 

How are we to acquire this faith — this faith, so 
grand in its effects and so prodigious in its nature that 
it can only be a création of God in our soûls ? Why, a 
man who believes is a more astounding thing than the 
création of a new world by the hand of God. How 
can we acquire it ? By asking for it. God gives it to 



FAITH. 



m 



him who asks. But here, my friends, we must take 
care. We miglit think this is a ver y easy and conven- 
ient thing, that, when we feel the need of faith, ail 
we have to do is to address a prayer to God, and 
receive it. Ah, no ! The gifts of God are not to 
be had so cheaply. Sometimes, certainly, it does please 
Him to show His power, and create a new rnan ail at 
once, in answer to a single prayer, but that is not the 
ordinary way of His Providence. 

Faith, although granted in answer to prayer, is the 
resuit of long and laborious effort, and it well deserves 
it. God wills that we strive that we may obtain. 

Adams, in his "Pensées" says very truly, "Frayer 
is the easiest of ail works ; but the prayer of faith, the 
hardest." 

We must fall often upon our knees, must repeat 
our prayers again and again, and thus show to God 
that we feel the value of faith. We must exercise it, 
too, as well as pray for it. We shall gain a little by a 
first prayer, and this will encourage us to pray more, 
and with increased fervor, and so we shall receive more 
and more. This is the only way in which we can suc- 
ceed. To increase our faith, we have to do three 
things : to pray for it, to put it in action, and to observe 
its results, as exemplified in the great saints of old, by 
a profound and earnest study of Scripture. We need 



64 



FAITH. 



not liope to receive any gift from God, if we do not 
feel and appreciate its worth. 

And now, in few words, I désire to make this appli- 
cation of what has been said. "We must treasure up a 
supply of faith for the future. We must labor to-daj 
for the faith we shall need five, ten, or twenty years 
hence. Lay up this spiritual store, day by day, that, 
being surrounded by the most abundant gifts of God, 
you have only to open your eyes and reach out your 
hands when the time cornes that your strength fails 
you even to pray; when the fainting spirit and the 
weary body becorne incapable of the terrible struggle 
of which faith is the récompense and the reward. 
Ah ! do not wait for your last moments to obtain faith. 
We can find it always, but let us apply ourselves in 
advance to providing for our last moments, by laying 
up and always adding to our store, increasing in faith 
day by day. 

My friends, I am in a position where nothing is of 
any value to me but faith. As our brother said in his 
prayer, faith gives us power and peace and joy. It is 
very easy, alas ! to say and to preach, before the mo- 
ment of trial, that faith must triumph over ail : but 
when the struggle cornes, face to face with the enemy ; 
when it is a question of gaining or losing ail ; when it 
oomes to following Jésus Christ, first in the morning 



FAITH. 



65 



to the désert, then in the evening to Gethsemane, and 
then in tlie afternoon to Golgotha, we feel that it is a 
serions matter. 

God be praised, eternallj praised ! You would un- 
derstand me yery ill, if you thought, because I speak in 
sthis way, that God does not support and succor me. 
He does so, admirably. But I want you to know be- 
forehand that the strnggle is hard — much harder than 
I thought before I passed through it — in order that 
you may do the same as I have done in my small meas- 
ure ; but I wish now that I had done much more. 

May you increase day by day in faith, and only 
live that you may increase in faith ! May you be, 
before God, men of faith and prayer, preparing your- 
selves, by doing His will to-day, to do His will to- 
morrow. 

Ah ! how greatly my sufferings would be sweet- 
ened, how greatly they are sweetened, by the thought 
that they are made useful to you, by the thought that 
the words I address you in my infirmity penetrate your 
hearts by the Holy Spirit ! Oh, my friends, little 
handful of men that we are here, if we were only men 
of faith, there would be many an eleventh chapter to 
the Hebrews to write, without leaving this " upper 
room ! " 



IX. 



JESUS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 

(December 9, 1855.) 

In tbe preserce of Jésus Christ, wlio feeds us witb 
His nesb and blood, and nourishes us continually by 
faitb, I bave it at heart to address a few words to tbose 
wbo suffer. I feel very sure tbat, bowever small my 
audience, my words will fall upon soil prepared to 
receive them, for we ail suffer, and tbose wbo suffer 
tbe most are not always tbose wbo seem to suffer tbe 
most. Tbere are pain and sorrow known to God and 
unknown to men; and, in e very condition of life, every 
créature tbat feels, tbat tbinks, and tbat believes, 
knows profoundly wbat it is to suffer. 

Tbere is something very antagonistic to our nature 
in pain, and it is very difficult to accustom ourselves to 
it, for it seem s to us as tbougb we ougbt to be always 
bappy. Tbis feeling is qui te legitimate, and does 



JESUS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 67 

honor to tlie goodness of our Creator. It is perfectly 
true that we ought to be entirely exempt from pain, 
and always filled with joy. But sin has deranged ail 
this, and now what was contrary to our nature has 
become natural. It enters now into God's plan for us, 
and has become our constant habit, as well as our eter- 
nal interest, that, in différent ways, we should ail suffer. 
You know how Job sums up and classifies the principal 
trials of life : loss of property, loss of those near and 
dear to us, and, last of ail, loss of health. This is rather 
Satan's arrangement of trials, and he thoroughly 
understands the art of temptation. If our hearts at 
this moment were to be ail opened, what a list of 
sufferings should we have to pour out before God ! 

Well, dear friends, I should have absolutely noth- 
ing to say to console you, were it not for the Word of 
God. There is no consolation in Nature Nature 
neither understands nor explains any thing, holds out 
no hope, no expectation. Ail natural hope and expec- 
tation are futile and vain. But I have abundance to 
tell you when I contemplate the cross of Jésus Christ, 
around which we are assembled to celebrate the mem- 
ory of His sacrifice. We are purified from our sins by 
His blood — understand it well — purified from our sins 
by His blood, redeemed by His bitter sacrifice, our sins 
expiated by His cross, in the simplest and most popu- 



68 JESUS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 

lar sensé, as well as in the most profound, Jésus being 
the propitiatory victim reconciling us to God by His 
death. 

This is the yery groundwork and core of the Gos- 
pel, and, without it, the Gospel would be blotted out 
and powerless. 

Under the cross, the aspect of pain changes com- 
pletely, and the change is in proportion to our faith. 
Jésus Christ, the Son of God, lias appeared in the 
world. And how ? As a man of joy ? No, as a man 
of sorrows. Here is a prodigy, astounding and unnat- 
ural ! The Son of God appeared upon earth, not only 
as a sufferer, but as enduring misery so intense that no 
human being can conceive of it. The cross of Jeaus 
is the very centre and sum of ail suffering, absorbing 
ail into itself. There is no pain or sorrow which is not 
a part of what He suffered there, none that His cross 
does not explain. 

My dear friends, when we remember that Christ 
suffered for us, and considar that suffering forms a feat- 
ure of resemblance in us with our Saviour — when, in 
view of the infinité character of His sufferings, we 
reflect that, the more we suffer, the closer becomes our 
resemblance to Him, is it not true that the aspect of 
pain is changed ? Does not the thought that He has 
borne it before we hâve, that even He could not be 



JESUS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 69 



spared, bring liglit and sweetness? What sufferer, 
liowever depressed in spirit he may be, is not borne up 
by the thonght : " It is like my Saviour ; it is a point of 
resemblance between Him and me ; now T know tliat 
I belong to Him, that He is calling me, and I begin to 
enter into God's views, and to understand His ways ; 
I nnite my cross to His cross, my sufferings to His suf- 
ferings ? " In this view St. Paul writes : " For whoin He 
did foreknow, lie also did predestinate to be conformed 
to the image of His Son, that He might be the first- 
born among many brethren. Moreover whom He did 
predestinate, them He also called : and whom He called, 
them He also justified : and whom He justified, them 
He also glorified." He desires us " to be conformed 
to the image of His Son ;" and the context shows that 
the conformity is to be essentially a conformity in suf- 
fering. 

This, then, is the first thonght which is powerful to 
cheer us. Sorrow is an essential part of the life of 
Jésus Christ, and therefore a point of resemblance be- 
tween Him and us. 

And, now, here is another. Why did Jésus Christ 
suffer? To expiât e sin. In suffering, then, we recog- 
nize the just conséquence of sin. "We cannot bear ail 
that our Saviour endured, but we shall be happy to 
bear our part, looking upon it as a just punishment. 



-70 JESUS CHRIST OUE EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 

" Wherefore dotli a living man complain, a man for 
tlie punishment of his sins ? " " Forasmuch then as 
Christ liatli suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves 
likewise with the same minci : for he that hath suf- 
fered in the flesh hath ceased from sin." Thèse words 
of St. Peter show lis that, in order to be freed from sin, 
we must suffer. It is necessary that sin and suffering 
be brought face to face in our own persons, and that 
suffering be made the agent to destrov the sin in us — 
not to be an expiation for sin, Christ alone is the expi- 
ation for sin — but that we may learn to associate pain 
and sorrow with sin, and joy with our sanctification 
and deliverance. The thought, then, that suffering is 
the fruit of sin, is a consoling thought, and calculated 
to buoy us up in our trials, because it shows us pain 
and suffering as a simple natural dispensation — a path 
in which we must walk — a trial which we cannot and 
ought not to be spared. 

Lastly, why did Jésus Christ suffer in expiation of 
sin ? To save us, and make us partakers of eternal 
glory, by His love. This is the leading thought in the 
contemplation of our Saviour's sufferings. 

In the same way, then, we should suffer in love, and 
not in selfishness. We should not think of ourselves, 
but of God first of ail, to glorify Him ; and then of our 
neighbor, to do him good. Christian suffering con- 



JESUS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 71 

tains treasures of love, and of the power of love, in the 
example that a Christian can show in afflictions, and 
in the patience which God gives him to bear them. 
What a sweet, heavenly thought that, in suffering, we 
can be of use to our fellow-men, especially to our breth- 
ren ! How otherwise can our sufferings so nearly ap- 
proach tliose of our Saviour ? St. Paul expresses the 
same idea in a passage I am fond of quoting : " I fill 
up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in 
my flesh, for His body's sake, which is the Church." 

I do not enter upon the explanation of this passage, 
for it présents difficulties. Assuredly St. Paul meant 
nothing less than suffering in expiation for sin, but he 
unités his sufferings to those of his Saviour. Because 
He suffered to save humanity, St. Paul suffers for the 
good of humanity ; as he wrote to Timothy : " In 
doing this, thou shalt both save thyself, and them that 
hear thee." 

See, then, the Christian's stay and comfort in suffer- 
ing. Christ has suffered : the more I suffer, the more 
I resemble Him, and pain becomes a privilège. Christ 
has suffered for sin : pain is therefore a fruit of sin, 
wholesome and necessary. Lastly, Christ has suffered 
to save : therefore I also ought to suffer for the good 
of others, and to lead soûls captive to the obédience of 
the cross. 



72 JESUS CHRIST OUE EXAMPLE IN SUFFERING. 

Let ail wlio suffer endeavor to forget themselves, 
not to give way to a selfisb. grief, witliout faith, with- 
out love, and which brings no consolation. Let them 
enter fully into the love of Christ, that tlieir trials also 
may be as a cross planted upon tlie earth, wbose 
sliadow may be tbe refuge of ail around them — not to 
give thern eternal life, but to point out the way which 
leads to it, for the glory of God. To Him be glory for 
ever and ever ! 

Let us rejoice in Him, and persuade ourselves well 
that, by the power of faith and of love, there is no pain, 
no suffering, which we cannot bear peacefully, and even 
happily; which we cannot make to conduce to the 
glory of God, to the welfare of man, and so greatly to 
our own consolation, that in heaven we shall consider 
it a great privilège to have suffered much here, under 
the cross of Jésus ! Amen. 



SIN. 

(December 16, 1855.) 

Mt dear friends, the Holy Communion brings to our 
minds the remembrance of the deepest joy 1 ever felt. 
But we must not forget that, even as Christ's path to 
glorv and to the résurrection was the way of the cross, 
this joy can be the expérience of those only who have 
begun by feeling the bitterness of sin ; and that, in pro- 
portion as we have felt the bitterness of sin, will be 
also our sensé of this joy. 

Oh, my friends, what is sin ? "Which one of us com- 
prehends ail the crime and bitterness existing in our 
midst, the fearful judgments that follow naturally in 
their train, and the absolute necessity of onr being 

1 " Who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, de- 
spising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of 
God." — Hebrews xii. 2. 
4 



n 



SIN. 



thoroughly washed and delivered from them before we 
can enjoy one moment's peace ! 

It seems to me that to meditate upon the depth and 
enormity of sin is the peculiar province of those who 
are especially called upon to suffer, and to ponder con- 
stantly over the mystery, that a God full of love should 
visit His children with suffering npon suffering. 

Take, for example, sucha man as François Gonthier, 
of jNyon. I have never known a person who, as far as 
hum an judgment can détermine, was more advanced 
in true and thorough Christian piety, uniting purity 
of faith with the spirit of humility and charity. And 
y et, this man, on whom one would think God would 
lavish every comfort and consolation, was visited, to 
the full, with ail His most bitter dispensations. 

He lost successively an only son, a tenderly-loved 
wife, and a daughter, twelve years old, his last remain- 
ing link with his lost treasures. Left alone, the hand 
of God made his loneliness still more lonely, by taking 
from him a dearly-loved sister, and afterward a nièce 
twenty years of âge, on whom he had concentrated ail 
his affection. He lost others besides, whom I do not 
mention. Add to this a state of health so seriously 
affected that he said to me, one day, " Do you know 
how I write my books ? Just as one would take the 
juice from an orange, by pressing it out slowly, drop 



15 



after drop." He was afflicted with exceeding weak- 
ness, and suffered almost continuai pain, and, as both 
pain and weakness constantly increased, his sufferings 
became greater and greater until the end of his life. 

When I reflect upon an existence like this, I say to 
myself, " "What is sin % " It may be said, I know well, 
tbat such a man is stricken for tbe good of tbe Church, 
for tbe sake of tbe instruction afforded by bis patience 
and cbeerfulness in enduring affliction, and tbis assur- 
edly forms bis greatest consolation, because establish- 
ing in bim a resemblance to our Saviour. 

But God would not have heaped ail thèse miseries 
upon a Gonthier, simply for the sake of other men's 
good. "We must not confound tbe créature with the 
Creator. God would, in tbat case, be making man a 
Saviour. He caused Jésus Christ to suffer for the sins 
of mankind, but in our case He never innicts any meas- 
ure of suffering upon us which our own personal sins 
bave not deserved. Our sins deserve far greater pun- 
ishment than we bave ever borne, far more suffering 
than we can even conceive of. 

This is the teaching of tbe Scriptures, and particu- 
larly of the Psalms, at every page. David cannot ap- 
proacb the subject of bis afflictions without gliding, as 
it were, imperceptibly and unconsciously into that of 
his sins. You will notice it partie ularly in the thirty- 



SIN. 



eighth Psalm, where lie so mingles his sufferings and 
his sins together that one hardi y knows how to distin- 
guish them. 

"What, then, is sin ? What is the horror which it 
présents to the eyes of God ? What is the punishment 
that it renders necessary? and what is the ransom 
winch alone can atone for it? 

Look at sin in an ordinary Christian — in one who, 
though never having reached the high standard of a 
Gonthier's Christian life, pursnes nevertheless a respect- 
able career, without dishonoring his Christian profes- 
sion, bnt has never felt ail the bitterness of sin. Ile 
has his afflictions, becanse we ail mnst ; but he has not 
known how to convert them into a cross, nor to mingle 
his sufferings with those of his Saviour. Look at the 
heart of such a Christian — who may nevertheless be a 
sincère man — and see what a mass of latent sin, of hid- 
den corruption, of secret infection, is lurking there. 
If that heart were to be suddenly laid open before us, 
what frightful horror it would cause us ! if indeed we 
have the capacity of feeling horror of sin, that is, the 
power to recognize the perfect holiness of God's law, 
and ail the holiness that this terrible law requires 
of us. 

Then look at sin in men of the world, men steeped 
in sin ; since they were born they have done nothing 



sin. 



11 



else than drink it like water, and breathe it in like air ; 
who are entirely formed and composed of sin, and 
enveloped, spiritually, with an ontside crust of it, 
which no ray of life-giving, health-giving, sanctifying 
light has ever penetrated ! What an abyss ! what a 
sepulchre ! what a spectacle before the eyes of God ! 
Thousands and millions of men scattered over the face 
of the earth in whom there is nothing else than this 
frightful sin, of which they hâve no consciousness even, 
other than, at most, a vague feeling which God sends 
them from time to time, to urge them to repentance, 
and they remain sunk in this fearful state, so abomi- 
nable in the eyes of God ! 

Sin in the very best of Christians, sin in ordinary 
Christians, sin in the Church, sin in the world ! Oh, 
my friends, what wretchedness, what misery ! What 
a fearful thing is sin ! 

This is what Jésus Christ saw when He descended 
from heaven to save us. ¥e did not know it, but He 
knew it, ¥e did not feel it, but He felt it for us, and 
this gave Him strength to endure the torture of the 
cross, the anguish of Gethsemane, the struggles of the 
désert, and ail the trials and humiliations that went 
before and made up His entire life. 

The sufferings, then, which He has borne for us 
détermine the measure of His estimate of sin ; of 



78 



SIN. 



the depth of the abyss from which He has raised us. 
]STone of us, no, my friends, not one of us, has the 
slightest idea of what sin is ! ¥e cannot know what 
sin is, because we cannot fully know our Saviour, nor 
His sufferings, nor His love. 

Oh, my friends, in the présence of this broken 
body, and of this shed blood, let us learn what sin is, 
and the péril of our soûls, that we may take refuge in 
Jésus, and seek only in Hirn that which He alone can 
give ! Let it sink well into our hearts that we shall 
never learn it otherwise than from Holy Scripture. 
Our own méditations will never reveal to us what 
sin is. 

Hère I particularly feel the necessity for, and the 
reality of, the inspiration and the divine authority of 
the Scriptures. "We should never have learned to 
know what sin is otherwise than by obédience to a 
superior authority, entirely outside and independent of 
our own inner feelings. We are doubtless called upon 
to work, ourselves, in study of this authority, in médi- 
tation, and in fervent prayer, but the brilliant truth 
cornes from above, given especially by the Spirit of God, 
and speaking with the authority of God Himself. For 
we are called upon to begin by accepting and acting 
upon a horror of sin, before we are yet capable of feel- 
ing it. 



SIN. 79 

My friends, let us cast ourselves into tlie arms of 
tlie Saviour. Do our earthly pains and sufferings hold 
us back % Have we even time to attend to them, when 
it is a question of saving our soûls 1 Let us go to 
Jésus in profound humiliation, but with confidence, 
without reserve, in Him who bas done ail and suffered 
ail for us. Oh, the infinité sweetness of perfect rest 
at the foot of His cross ! I begin to perceive the depth 
of my misery and wretchedness, but I embrace the cross 
of my Saviour, and I want nothing else ; grâce and 
justice from the cross alone ; no admixture of my own 
works. My own works ! They could only condemn 
me ; but purchased by Him, and washed in His blood 
who h as expiated my sins, I cling to the cross, and find 
my only support in my Saviour 's sacrifice. 

Let us talk, then, of the Saviour to those who do 
not know Him. Having so terrible a disease, differing 
from ail earthly diseases, in being the only one which 
is really evil— the principle, indeed, of ail evil— and 
with such a remedy in our hands, as we have, differing 
from ail earthly remédies, in that it is alone sure and 
infallible, how can we pass through life, mingle in 
society, dwell in our families, among our neighbors 
and friends, without talking to them of sin and of 
Jésus Christ, who is their Saviour and ours ? 

Let us seize hold upon the cross, let us proclaim 



80 



SIN. 



the cross. Let us die embracing it, let us die pro- 
claiming it, and our death will be the beginning of 
life ; and God will be glorified in us, whether by oui 
life or by our death, and, above ail, by the blood and 
the rédemption of the Lamb of God. This is what I 
ask of God for each one of you, as I ask it for myself, 
in the love of Christ, which I beseech Him to increase 
in us. Amen. 



XI. 



THE CROSS REVEALLNG TO US THE LOYE OF 

GOD. 

(December 23, 1855.) 

Psalm lxxxviii : " 0 Lord God of my salvation, I hâve cried day ând 
night before Thee : Let my prayer corne before Thee : incline Thine ear 
unto my cry ; for my soul is full of troubles : and my life draweth nigb 
unto the grave. I am counted with them that go down into the pit : I 
am as a man that hath no strength : Free among the dead, like the slain 
that lie in the grave, whom Thou rememberest no more : and they are 
eut ofif from Thy hand. Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, 
in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me 
with ail Thy waves. Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far frora 
me ; Thou hast made me an abomination unto them : I am shut up, and 
I cannot corne forth. Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction: Lord, I 
have called daily upon Thee, I have stretched out my hands unto Thee. 
Wilt thou show wondêrs to the dead ? Shall the dead arise and praise 
Thee ? Shall Thy loving-kindness be declared in the grave ? or Thy faith- 
fulness in destruction ? Shall Thy wonders be known in the dark ? and 
Thy righteousness in the land of forgetfulness ? But unto Thee have I 
cried, 0 Lord ; and in the morning shall my prayer prevent Thee. Lord, 
why castest Thou off my soul ? why hidest Thou Thy face from me ? I 
am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up : while I suffer Thy ter- 
rors I am distracted. Thy fierce wrath goeth over me ; Thy terrors have 



82 



THE CKOSS REVEÀLING TO US 



eut me off. They came round about me daily like water ; they compassed 
me about together. Lover and friend hast Thou put far from me, and 
mine acquaintance into darkness." 

My good friends, you give me a very touching 
proof of your fraternal sympathy and affection in com- 
ing to partake, with me, of the Supper of our Lord, 
which every week nourishes and strengthens my spirit 
and my body. 

There is a feature in the eighty-eighth Psalm, read 
to us at the beginning of our service, peculiar to this 
Psalm, and found in no other. It is the only one 
which is ail sorrow and sadness, which does not con- • 
clude with one word, one gleam of consolation. It is 
ail black, ail dark, and one must look very closely to 
find even a germ of hope in the name given to God in 
the first verse : u Lord God of my salvation." Why 
this astounding mystery ? I think there are two ex- 
planations : First, God wishes to show us that, al- 
though in His habituai mercy we never cry to Him 
without finding relief, although often a few verses 
only separate the most fearful anguish from the most 
abundant consolation (as in the thirteenth Psalm, for 
example), it may nevertheless sometimes enter into 
our Lord's views to let us cry, for a certain time, with- 
out response and without consolation, without even 
His sending us the smallest ray of light to relieve our 



THE LOYE OF GOD. 



83 



distress. Then it is that we must live by faith alone, 
and, with Jereiniah, David, and ail other saints who 
hâve been tried in this manner, we must wait ; we must 
ask Him why He conceals Himself, and, in spite of the 
cloud which hides Him from our view, we must never 
doubt Him. 

This one Psalm alone, out of the whole hundred 
and fifty, teaches us this lesson. It is as if it were 
painful to our Lord's love to give us this warning. 

But there is a second explanation, attaching itself, 
however, to the fîrst. You know that the Psalms are 
full of the Messiah. It is Christ who speaks, who tells 
of His sorrows. "We find here — Psalm lxxxviii. — the 
same Saviour who, in Psalm xxii., utters the words 
" Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani — my God, my God, why 
hast Thou forsaken me ! " and, almost immediately fol- 
lowing, we find: "But Thou art holy," and " They 
trusted, and Thou didst deliver them." This Psalm 
thus shows us that the Saviour experienced an amount 
of distress far surpassing any thing which man, even 
the most severely-tried servants of God, can feel or 
even conceive of. 

And why is this ? Because " God is love." Strange 
reply, but true. God is love. My dear friends, how- 
ever abundantly we may be blessed with the gifts of 
God, temporal and spiritual, of every kind — with His 



64 



THE CROSS REVEALINGr TO US 



"Word, His promises, and ail else — there is something 
wanting, if one dare say so, in God's love, to enable 
it to find tbe road to our hearts. This something is 
suffering. ¥e know that God cannot snffer ; that He 
is exalted far above ail pain, as above ail earthly temp- 
tations and angnisb ; so it was necessary, to make us 
understand tbe love of God in its fulness and reality, 
that He sbould présent Himself to us in sucb a way as 
to be able to prove His love to us by His suffering ; 
since m an would ne ver bave been persuaded, or ratber 
gained over, in any otber manner. 

Jésus Christ, tben, tbe Son of God, and God Him- 
self, became man, in order to be able to suffer, and thus 
show us His love in a light and with a force strong 
enough to break even the hardest hearts, if they reflect 
ever so little. Jésus came upon earth to suffer. And 
how thoroughly He performed His task ! He began 
by clothing Himself with flesh like that of our sinful 
bodies. Can one conceive of such a depth of dégrada- 
tion, self-renunciation, and sacrifice, for the Lord of 
Glory, the Prince of Life, to descend to the wretched- 
ness and misery of our poor nature, to accept ail its 
humiliations, even unto the grave ? " Being in the 
form of God, He thought it not robbery to be equal 
with God: but made Himself of no réputation, and 
took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made 



THE LOYE OF GOD. 



85 



in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion 
as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient 
unto death, even tbe death of the cross." 

Remark that what distinguishes tbe sufferings and 
sacrifice of Jésus Christ from our own is, that He chose 
them voluntarily, that He asked for them. Nothing 
obliged Him to the course He pursued. He chose and 
sought out His sufferings one after the other, to accom- 
plish the will of His Father, but He did it of His own 
îree-will. 

And why ? For us, because He could not bear the 
thought of the eternal misery to which sin had con- 
demned us. "What love, my God, what love ! 

I pass rapidly over His whole earlier career of suf- 
fering and humiliation, and corne at once to Gethse- 
mane. In the middle of the night you enter the gar- 
den of olive-trees, and see a man lying on the ground, 
with his face toward the earth ; he is weeping, crying 
aloud ; you take him perhaps for a madman. It is 
your Saviour ! By His very posture, by His prayers, 
by His tender ^ reproaches to His disciples, you can 
measure the immensity of His suffering — an anguish 
we are no more capable of un der standing than we are 
able to conceive of God or of infinity ; for it is not only 
an outward physical suffering, but a spiritual suffering 
of which we can form no idea. 



8ô 



THE CKOSS REYEALING TO US 



Not saints alone, but men who hâve never known 
the Lord, hâve borne patiently the rnost frightful tor- 
tures ; but in Jésus, besides His infinité suffering, there 
was a secret, inner anguish into which we can never 
pénétrât e — the anguish of bearing alone, before the 
Holy God, the burden of our sins ; He innocent for 
us guilty ; the anguish of feeling Himself (though I 
hardly dare to speak of this nrystery) for a moment 
separated, by our sins, from the love of the Father, if 
one can say so, although at the saine time one with 
Him, and constrained to cry : " My God, my God, 
why hast Thou forsaken me ? " 

And why does He suffer thus ? For thee, sinner, 
for thee. So dearly did He love thee, that, wert thou 
the only one on earth to be saved, for thee alone would 
He have entered the garden of Gethsemane. "What 
love, my God, what love ! 

Lastly, look upon the cross. I will not dwell upon 
this subject, had I even the strength. How can I de- 
scribe so great a mystery ? "With you, I stand at the 
foot of the cross, and watch the sufferings of my Sav- 
iour. I call your attention to one thing : in the very 
moment when He is given up to the most cruel an- 
guish, to a frightful agony of which man can never 
know, nor conceive, no, nor even ever gain the faintest 
gliropse, in that very moment He overcomes His pain 



THE LOVE OF GOD. 87 

and suffering to glorify God and to save man, even 
unto the end. From the veiy depths of His death- 
agony, we hear, " Father, forgive them, for they know 
not what they do " — " Woman, behold thy son " — 
" Disciple, behold thy mother." What love, niy 
God, what love ! 

Last Sunday, at the foot of the cross, we were con- 
templating the view we have there, of the horror, the 
enormity, and the terrors^pf sin. How sweet it is, to- 
day, in contemplating the sufferings of onr Saviour, to 
gaze npon the view which they présent to us of the 
grandeur and incompréhensible depth of the mercy of 
God! 

Oh, my friends! let us always keep His love be- 
fore our eyes, and ail will be explained to us, even the 
most cruel sufferings ; for they are, in His people, only 
the conséquences of what He Himself has suffered. 
At the same time, ail becomes sweet and easy to us. 
Faith makes every thing possible, and love makes 
every thing easy. " His commandments are not griev- 
ous." 

Filled, then, with this image of our Saviour's love, 
and of the love of God as revealed in Him, reading in 
the father-heart of God His love for us, we shall dévote 
ourselves to the Lord, to do and to suffer ail that He 
may see fit to ordain for us. Ask of God to be deeply 



88 THE CEOSS REVEALING TO US, ETC. 

penetrated with the thought, " God is love," and, in 
order to this, let ns cling to the foot of onr Savionr's 
cross and never lose hold or sight of it, nntil, after hav- 
ing let ns suffer a little — since this is necessary — He 
takes us by the h and, leads ns throngh the dark interval 
between Friday and Snnday morning, raîses ns np 
again with Himself, and establishes ns with Him, in 
His home of glory, where He awaits us, where we 
shall bless Him for evermor§, in proportion as we have 
snffered here, especially if our suffering has been for 
His name. Amen. 



XII. 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 

(December 30, 1855.) 

Révélation xxii. : " And he showed me a pure river of water of life, 
clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. 
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there 
the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit 
every month : and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the na- 
tions. And there shall be no more curse : but the throne of God and of 
the Lamb shall be in it ; and His servants sball serve Him: and they 
shall see His face ; and His name shall be in their foreheads. And there 
shall be no night there ; and they need no candie, neither light of the 
sun ; for the Lord God giveth them light : and they shall reign for ever 
and ever. And he said unto me, Thèse sayings are faithful and true : 
and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent His angel to show unto His 
servants the things which must shortly be done. Behold, I corne quickly : 
blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book. And 
I John saw thèse things and heard them. And when I had heard and 
seen, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel which shewed 
me thèse things. Then saith he unto me, See thou do it not : for I am 
thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which 
keep the sayings of this book : worship God. And he saith unto me, 
Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book : for the time is at hand. 
He that is unjust, let him be unjust still : and he which is filthy, let him 
be filthy still : and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still : and ho 



90 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 



that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I corne quickly ; and my 
reward is vrith me, to give every man according as his work shall be. I 
am Alpha and Oméga, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. 
Blessed are they who do His commandments, that they may have right 
to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gâtes into the city. For 
without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and 
idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. I Jésus have sent mine 
. angel to testify unto you thèse things in the churches. I am the root 
and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. And the 
Spirit and the bride say, Corne. And let him that heareth say, Corne. 
And let him that is athirst corne. And whosoever will, let him take the 
water of life freely. For I testify unto every man that heareth the words 
of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto thèse things, 
God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book : and 
if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, 
God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy 
city, and from the things which are written in this book. He which tes- 
tifieth thèse things saith, Surely I corne quickly. Amen. Even so, corne, 
Lord Jésus. The grâce of our Lord Jésus Christ be with you ail. Amén." 

The chapter just read to us would sufïice alone to 
fill our hearts with strength and joy forever, if we 
could receive its truths with perfect simplicit y of faith. 
If a man, crushed by poverty, were assured that he 
would make his fortune to-morrow ; or one, borne 
down by suffering, that to-morrow he would enter upon 
a new life of comfort, would he not find strength to 
wait a few hours, and, cheered by his hope, would 
he not overstep the short space of time which might 
still separate him from happiness ? 

And we too, my friends, if we had a sure and sim- 
ple faith, a clear view of that eternal happiness so 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 



91 



beautifully and touchingly depicted in the last chapter 
of the Révélation, should not we also say, " Conie, 
Lord Jésus ! " and should we not say it in perfect 
peace ? What more do we want than God has given 
us ? Nothing but what He can give us still — simple 
faith in the " invisible things." We are living for 
time ; ail we have to do is, to live for eternity. We 
are eonstantly enchained by the visible things of earth ; 
ail we have to do is, to enter into communion with the 
" invisible things of God." I say, ail we have to do : 
but it is a great deal to do, an immense change to 
make. For sin does not only consist in the grosser 
forms of disobedience to the divine law prévalent in 
the world, but in far more deep and subtle guise ; in- 
credulity and the enticements of visible things consti- 
tute sin, and form indeed its very source. 

As God is invisible, and the soul and centre of 
things invisible, it is only because we are by nature far 
from God, that we require so great an effort to feed 
ourselves upon invisible things. It is the character- 
istic of the Word of God, that it lives and moves in 
the midst of the invisible, and this alone, to the think- 
ing man, is proof enough of its divine inspiration. It 
is not given to man, the slave by his fallen nature of 
visible things, to raise himself out of, and above them, 
namely, to rise out of himself, to the level of the invis- 



92 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 



ible things, and to speak from out their midst as the 
"Word of God does. Man cannot speak as Jésus Christ, 
the Son of Man, speaks, who, dwelling in heaven, 
speaks of heaven ; nor as the organs divinely appointed 
to transmit to us the Word of God speak to us ; for 
the "Word, being full of God, although upon earth, 
speaks from heaven by that prodigy of God's grâce 
called by us Inspiration, which constitutes its divine 
authority — that pure and holy book, the book of God, 
so far above us and above the world, which tells us of 
another world, and speaks to us out of the rnidst of 
that other world ! 

How are we to be brought into communication 
with the invisible things ? Hère we ail feel our need 
and our infirmity : but let us feel what our strength 
would be, our happiness, our peace, and our joy, if, like 
the Word of God, like Jésus Christ, we could live and 
move in the midst of the invisible ; if, by the power of 
faith, we could, in advance, be transported into God, 
and into the things of God, and see them as He sees 
them ; if we were able to measure them by His stand- 
ard, to appreciate them as He does, and to judge them 
as He judges them ! " For if we would judge our- 
selves, we should not be judged," are words we have 
heard to-day, and His words. 

As we have seen, then, the first means of putting 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 



03 



ourselves in communication with the invisible things 
is, to live with the Holy Scriptures, the word and testi- 
mony of God, By living with them, I do not only 
mean reading them daily, and accepting their testi- 
mony, but we must feed upon them, seek in them the 
bread of life which came down from heaven, seek in 
them the Lord Jésus Christ Himself, the living bread 
which gives life to the world, whose flesh has been 
torn and lacerated for you, for me, for us ail. We 
must receive it in faith, particularly in the Sacrament 
of the Holy Supper, which places the object of our 
faith so vividly before our eyes. 

"We must feed upon the Word of God, my dear 
friends, must live with it constantly, day and night. 
Let it be to us what it was to the author of the hun- 
dred-and-nineteenth Psalm, out of whose hundred and 
seventy-six verses there are only two or three in which 
the Word of God is not mentioned by one of the in- 
numerable names given to it by the Psalmist. Ah ! 
let us live with the Word of God ! Let us surround 
ourselves constantly with the atmosphère of the Script- 
ures, for it is the atmosphère of heaven and of God 
Himself \ 

And, to put ourselves into communion with the in- 
visible things, let us pray without ceasing. Tes, pray : 
but how ? Pray, O my God, as if we saw Thee, as if 



94 



THE INVISIBLE THIXGS OF GOD. 



speaking witk Tliee and listening to Thee, feeling Thy 
présence,, and delighting in Thy Word. Who will 
teaeh ns to pray, if not Thon, O God of prayer ? 
Pardon, rny God, the prayers of Thy Church — Thy 
Church, which alone in the world knows how to pray. 
Pardon the way in which we pray ourselves, onr lan- 
guor, onr uncertainty, onr incredulity, even in the best, 
the least unfaithful, the least nnbelie^ng moments of 
onr Christian life and onr Christian ministry ! Par- 
don, O God, the sinfulness of onr holy offerings! 
Ah ! if by prayer we conld, at this moment, clear the 
space that séparâtes us from Thee ! If we conld pray 
as Jesns prayed ! as Moses, David, St. Paul, St. John ! 
if we could pray — really pray — earnestly pray — as St. 
James said, speaking of Elias, " he prayed earnestly ! " 
We pray, alas ! for the most part, without praying ! 
We have no idea of the weakness and unbelief which 
mingle with our prayers, because we do not live among 
the invisible things; nor have we any idea of the 
amount of grâce and blessings of which we thereby 
deprive ourselves. Oh ! my friends, let us constantly 
repeat the prayer, " Lord, teach us to pray ! " Wlien 
we know how to pray, we shall know ail, and, what is 
better, we shall have ail. We shall know Jésus Christ, 
and, better than knowing Him, we shall possess Him ; 
for we cannot know Him until we possess Him, and, in 



THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF GOD. 95 

possessing Him, we know Him; knowing, we love 
Him, and by faith triumph with Him over ail visible 
things, and crush Satan under our feet. May the God 
of peace Himself crush Satan under our feet ! 

My friends, the invisible things of God ! the things 
of the last chapter of the Révélation ! . . . We shall 
soon appear before God — not only those who are 
awaiting their summons, day by day ; who are more 
especially warned by their Lord to hold themselves in 
readiness, and who rejoice, yea ! ardently long for the 
moment when Jésus will say to them, " Corne ! " — but 
it is equally true for us ail. ÎTone of us can be sure 
that he will live until the evening. 

JVow, while you have the iree use of ail your facul- 
ties, now is the time to put yourselves in communica- 
tion with the invisible things, by means of the Word 
of God, and by prayer. Thèse are very old things that 
I am telling you, but, alas ! our incredulity and want 
of fervor make them very new things ! 

Seek the invisible things. Seek God Himself, en- 
throned in the midst of the invisible world, through 
Jésus Christ, who has opened it for us by the veil, that 
is to say, His broken body, and whose love and whose 
sufferings form the measure of the joy which He has 
prepared for us. " Though it tarry, wait for it ; be- 
cause it will surely corne, it will not tarry." 



XIII. 

THE MAN OF SORROWS AND MEN OF SOR- 
ROWS. 

(January 6, 1856.) 

The Christian in affliction is directly called by God 
to meditate upon the place which affliction occnpies in 
the plans of the divine rédemption, in the develop- 
ment of the kingdom of God on earth, and in the 
révélation of the Holy Scriptures, It is then that he 
understands the words, at once so simple and so pro- 
found : " Think it not strange, as thongh some strange 
thing happened nnto you." It wonld be strange in- 
deed if we could be matnred for eternal life withont 
afflictions ; and, more particularly, if a servant of God 
conld see himself blessed in his labors, I do not merely 
say without afflictions, but withont a large measnre of 
afflictions : " We must through much tribulation enter 
into the kingdom of God." Tins doctrine is clearly 



THE MAN OF SORROWS, ETC. 



9*7 



sliown us, in the first place, in Him whose sacrifice we 
are now celebrating, since it is to His sorrows and His 
sacrifice alone that we owe our eternal life. The Sav- 
iour was " a m an of sorrows and acquainted with 
grief ; " not only a man of sorrows, but the m an of 
sorrows upon whom ail sorrows, of ail kinds, were 
Leaped ; such suffering as it will never be in the power 
of man to endure, nor even to conceive of. Like the 
master, so also were the disciples ; and — to speak more 
especially of those His inspired organs, in whom He 
was more particularly manifested, and, so to say, repro- 
duced — the disciples of our Lord Jésus Christ formed 
a long succession of men of sorrows, from Abel down 
to St. Paul and St. John. We are not sufïîcieutly 
struck by this, after a superficial study of Scripture, 
but, on looking somewhat deeper into the Word of 
God, it becomes more and more striking. 

The Apostles aud Prophets are presented to us 
every where in Scripture as men of sorrows ; of sorrows, 
too, greater that we know or perceive, as Holy Writ 
gives us rather glimpses of them only, than shows them 
to us with clearness ; for if we were to be instructed in 
ail the sufferings of the men of God, it would be neces- 
sary to recount to us in détail the whole history of 
their lives. 

First, the Apostles : There is only one whose life 
5 



98 



THE MAN OF SOKROWS 



has been handed down to us with some minuteness, a 
man whose ministry God defined as one of sorrows, 
for He said, when He called Him : " I will show him 
what great things he must suffer for my name's sake." 
If we folio w St. Paul's career, we find his life, from 
the beginning to the end, only a séries of inward and 
outward sufferings. Hear what he says himself, in 
the last verses of the eleventh chapter of the second 
Epistle to the Corinthians : 

" Are they ministers of Christ ? (I speak as a fool) 
I am more ; in labors more abundant, in stripes above 
measure, in prisons more fréquent, in deaths oft. Of 
the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. 
Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, 
thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have 
been in the deep ; in journeyings often, in périls of 
waters, in périls of robbers, in périls by mine own coun- 
trymen, in périls by the heathen, in périls in the city, 
in périls in the wilderness, in périls in the sea, in pér- 
ils amongst false brethren ; in weariness and painful- 
ness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fast- 
ings often, in cold and nakedness. Beside those things 
that are without, that which cometh npon me daily, 
the care of ail the churches. Who is weak, and I am 
not weak ? Who is offended, and I burn not ? " 

Weigh every détail separately. "What a picture ! 



AND MEN OF SORROWS. 99 

What a life, inwardly and outwardly ! You see tlie 
measure of his love in the measure of his sufferings. 

And now of the prophets : St. James says, " Take, 
my brethren, the prophets who have spoken in the 
name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction 
and of patience." If we study the lives of the prophets 
with some attention, of those particularly whose his- 
tory we know rather less imperfectly than we do that 
of the others, we shall find tins assertion exactly veri- 
fied. Jeremiah, for instance, one of those of whom we 
know some little. But, of ail the prophets, the best 
known to us is David ; his history is told us with more 
minuteness of détail than that of any other. Have 
you ever renected upon the sorrows and sufferings 
which filled up David's life ? If you take his life as 
described in the first and second books of Samuel, and 
in the books of Kings also, and Chronicles, you will 
know nothing about him. There you see David in 
the beginning of his life, pursued by Saul. He had 
numerous enemies, but, after ail, he triumphed over 
Saul and achieved great glory. Next, you see him in 
deep affliction, stricken in the bosom of his family, by 
the just conséquence of his sins ; but at the same time 
abundantly consoled and supported by God, who, even 
in His most dreadful chastisements, remembers His 
promises to David, and His great mercy to him. We 



100 



THE M AN OF SORROWS 



find much trial and agitation in his life, but this does 
not give us an adéquate idea of his sufferings. ¥e 
must read the Psalms, to learn of thèse. The Psalms 
reveal to us the inner life of David, and, in so doing, 
show us, in some sort, the inner man of ail the prophets 
of God. "Well, the Psalms are ail crowded with expres- 
sions of unheard-of sorrow. David speaks in them 
unceasingly of his ills, his diseases, and of his enemies 
without number. It is hard indeed to understand who 
or what he means by the enemies of whom he so con- 
stantly complains, but his Psalms lay bare to us an 
amount of inward sorrow which we should never have 
suspected if his history were ail that we knew of him. 
To reveal him in this light is one of the chief objects 
of the Psalms. Pead the thirty-eighth, and ponder 
every word of it : 

" O Lord, rebuke me not in Thy wrath ; neither 
chasten me in Thy hot displeasure. For thine arrows 
stick fast in me, and Thy hand presseth me sore. 
There is no soundness in my flesh because of Thine 
anger ; neither is there any rest in my bones because 
of my sin. For mine iniquities are gone over mine 
head : as a heavy burden they are too heavy for me. 
My wouncls stink and are corrupt because of my fool- 
ishness. I am troubled ; I am bowed down greatly ; 
I go mourning ail the day long. For my loins are 



AND MEN OF SORROWS. 



101 



filled with a loatbsome disease : and there is no 
soundness in my flesb. I ara feeble and sore broken : 
I li ave roared by reason of tbe disquietness of my 
heart. Lord, ail my désire is before Tbee ; and my 
groaning is not bid from Thee. My beart pantetb, 
my strengtb failetb me : as for tbe ligbt of mine eyes, 
it also is gone from me. My lovers and my friends 
stand aloof from my sore ; and my kinsmen stand afar 
off. Tbey also tbat seek after my life lay snares for 
me : and tbey tbat seek my bnrt speak miscbievous 
tbings, and imagine deceits ail tbe day long. But I, 
as a deaf man, beard not ; and I was as a dumb man 
tbat openetb not bis moutb. Tbus I was as a man tbat 
bearetb not, and in wbose moutb are no reproofs. For 
in Tbee, O Lord, do I bope. Tbou wilt bear, O Lord 
my God. For I said, Hear me, lest otberwise tbey 
sbould rejoice over me : wben my foot slippeth, tbey 
magnify tbemselves against me. For I am ready to 
balt, and my sorrow is continually before me. For I 
will déclare mine iniquity ; I will be sorry for my sin. 
But mine enemies are lively, and tbey are strong: 
and they tbat bate me wrongfully are multiplied. 
Tbey also tbat render evil for good are mine adversa- 
ries ; because I follow tbe tbing tbat good is. Forsake 
me not, O Lord ; O my God, be not far from me. 
Make baste to belp me, O Lord my salvation." 



102 



THE MAN OF SORROWS 



Assailed by innumerable enernies, crushed by con- 
sciousness of bis sin, and afflicted with a complication 
of maladies ; liis eyes diseased,- tbeir sight gone, his 
loins inflamed, liis body bent so tliat be can hardly 
walk ; bis sores rnnning and exhaling fetid humors — 
so be represents bimself in tbis Psalm, and, if you read 
tbe sixtb or tbe sixty-nintb or many otbers, you will 
find bim in Kke affliction. Truly is be a man over- 
whehned vv T itb sorrow. We may not say tbat, becanse 
David was a type of Jésus Cbrist, tbese sufferings ap- 
ply to tbe Messiab. Doubtless bis afflictions were a 
type of tbose of tbe Messiab, and were so only because 
tbey were afflictions ; it is precisely because David 
was a man of sorrows, tbat be was a type of Tbe Man 
of sorrows. 

But, dear friends, sball we stop bere ? After bav- 
ing seen tbat tbe apostles and propbets were men of 
sorrows, sball we go no furtber tban to dwell in sad- 
ness upon tbeir sufferings ? Tbey were not only men 
of sorrows, but men wbo conquered tbeir sorrows and 
made tbem redound to tbe glory of God. Jésus Cbrist, 
at tbe bead of His own, triumpbs over His suffering 
and pursues His mission of cbarity even to tbe most 
cruel anguisb. In Getbsemane, we bear Him exbort- 
ing His disciples and preserving perfect liberty of 
spirit, in His désire to falfil, for tbeir good, His minis- 



AND MEN OF SORROWS. 



103 



try of love. It was the same upon the cross ; He 
allowed no opportunity to escape Him of giving to His 
disciples, to the people, to John, Mary, and to ail, lës- 
sons of eternal life, until the close of His fearful agony. 
The Man of sorrows triumphed over His sorrows, to 
accoinplish, in and by means of His sorrows, the mis- 
sion He came to fulfil. 

And His disc-ples in the same way, and the same 
with the apostles. What nse does St. Paul raake of 
his afflictions ? He consecrates them ail to the glory 
of God. He is not crushed and overwkelmed by his 
sufferings, as we so easily are, bnt triumphs over thero, 
bythe loveof Christ, and, with marvellons faithfulness, 
makes them ail tend to the advancement of the king- 
dom of God. 

David, too, npon whom I have more particularly 
dwelt, have you not noticed how he triumphs over his 
sufferings, to do his work ? The chief mission which 
David received from God was the composition of 
Psalms for ail générations of the Church, and thèse, or 
a large portion of them, he composes in the midst of 
the most cruel suffering. Imagine yourself, crushed 
down by physical, moral, and spiritual pain, called 
upon to compose a Psalm ; and yet from out ail thèse 
sufferings spring forth at the moment, even when they 
are such as David describes in the thirty-eighth Psalm, 



104 



THE MAN OF SORROWS 



hymns to the glory of God and for the instruction of 
the Church. "Wliat triuinph for David over hiniself, 
and wliat a humiliation for us, who in our weakness 
are, for the most part, obliged to wait until our pains 
have passed away, before we or others can reap the 
fruit of them ! But David writes his Psalnis in the 
very moments of his pain and sorrow. His thirty- 
eighth Psalm was written while he was suffering per- 
sécution, inward torment, and the bitterness of sin. I 
know it may be said that this Psalm was written in 
cold blood; that David may have carried himself 
back into trial and affliction that had passed away, 
as the poet transports himself in imagination into suf- 
fering and trials which he has never endured. But no, 
this supposition is as répugnant to you as it is to me. 
It was in the furnace, from the midst of the glowing 
furnace of affliction itself, that he wrote thèse lines, 
which were to serve for the encouragement of the 
Church in ail âges. 

Oh, wondrous power of the love of Christ ! What 
renunciation of selfish will ! oh, the grâce of the true 
servant of God ! oh, the courage of the apostle and the 
prophet ! the virtue of Christ ancl of the Holy Spirit 
in them ! For uever could man attain to such force of 
will, to such a triumph over the nesh ! 

My dear friends, the application of this subject I 



AND MEN OF SORROWS. 



105 



leave to each one of you. It résolves itself into two 
questions. Are we men of sorrows, and in what meas- 
nre do we share in the afflictions of Christ ? If we 
have our share in the afflictions of Christ, have we 
learned to triumph over them and to offer them, by the 
power of love, to the glory of God, and the welfare of 
our neighbors and brethren ? And do they, at the 
same time, and ail the more on that account, work to- 
gether for our sanctification, nourish and support us, 
and lay up for us the treasure of an excellent glory % 



XIV. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

I. THE SECEET OF A HOLT, ACTIVE, AND PEACEEUL LIEE. 

(Jannary 13, 1856.) 

Mt beloved in the Beloved of the Father, I thank 
God that He permits me still to speak to you in His 
naine, for jour encouragement and for my own conso- 
lation ; but I hâve need that you exercise toward me 
the patience of God, to whom we are pleasing " accord- 
ing to what we have, and not according to what we 
have not." My declining strength prevents me from 
either raising or turning myself, so that this is the only 
position in which I can address you. I hope, however, 
to be able to speak distinctly enough to be heard by 
you ail. 

It is a very striking situation, that of a man who 
has already lived several months, and will live perhaps 
some time longer — how long he knows not — with the 
abiding thought that ail his ties to life are broken ; 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 107 

that the liand of God has stricken liim incurably and 
mortally, uncertain at what moment the paternal voice 
may call kim to His bosom. He must be either very 
insensible, or very unreflecting, and devoid of ail 
Christian feeling, if he does not turn his thoughts 
backward, and look upon his past life. At the same 
time, as thoughts of recovery spring up, and ought to 
spring up, in his mind (since, after ail, he is in the 
hands of God, who raises the dead, and has already 
raised others more nearly dead than he), he is led to 
ask himself, " If life were to be restored to me, what 
use should I make of it 1 " While he remembers the 
feebleness and frailty of his resolutions, as proved by 
his whole past life, he hopes, nevertheless, in the good- 
ness of God, that the Visitation may not be lost, in its 
influence upon a second part of his career and minis- 
try. I say to myself, then : " I would fain do so and so ; 
there is certainly nothing at ail that I would not wish 
to do far otherwise and better than I have done, and 
there is a certain humiliation, salutary for me, as there 
may be salutary instruction for y ou, in dwelling upon 
the regrets of a dying man, or one who at ail events 
thihks himself such, and figures to himself the new use 
he would make of life, were it restored to him." It is 
more particularly in this direction that I propose to 
occupy your thoughts in thèse addresses. 



108 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



To select at once an especial example. Here is a 
point in which, if I had to begin again, I should de- 
sire to make a considérable change in my life — I mean 
in my inner life. I need not say tliat the exact appli- 
cations of the principle I have stated belong only to 
the Lord ; bnt there are, nevertheless, other applica- 
tions of a more gênerai character, which, with perfect 
propriety, may be discnssed in a little assemblage like 
this — prayer, for example, reading the Bible, and 
Christian liberty. 

This point, then, strikes me : I regret that I have 
regulated my life too nruch according to my own 
plans ; I mean^ 'according to my own views of faith- 
fulness and Christian sanctification, and not simply 
enough npon the plan which the Lord nnfolds for each 
one of ns, before our eyes. I think it will be easy for 
me to make my thonght clear in few words, so that 
each child of God can enter into it. ~We are ail of us 
inclined to form for ourselves a certain idéal of Chris- 
tian life, Christian activity, and Christian ministry, 
and to attach to onr idéal certain plans and methods 
of life, and we are not content unless we sncceed in 
realizing them. It is important, then, that our plans 
be the best possible, and that we seek the best means 
of carrying them out. This is ail very well, no doubt, 
but there is a defect at the bottom of it. Self is there, 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 109 



the hiclden self, rooted in the depths of the heart, and 
too clearly showing itself in onr best and purest works. 

What I would désire to do, on the otlier liand, 
would be to form the plan of my life and daily con- 
duct, not after my own ideas and feelings, bnt accord- 
ing to the commandments of God, to the inner testi- 
monies given ns of His will, to the leacling of the Holy 
Spirit, and to the ontward direction which He gives to 
onr life. 

Yon will thoroughly nnclerstand my idea of the 
manner in which I shonlcl wish to regnlate my life, if 
yon consider the manner in which Jesns regnlated His. 
We do not find that He adopted any plan or method, 
as many good people do, giving themselves mnch 
tronble abont it, and finding themselves often greatly 
tormented thereby; losing, besides, much valnable 
time which might have been better employed. Bnt 
what do we find ? We find in Him (I am considering 
Him now only as Son of Man) a man whose sole pnr- 
pose in life is to fulfil the mission received from the 
Father, and whose only plan of life is to enter into 
and adopt the Father's plan. His eyes are fixed npon 
the Father. He occnpies Himself merely in listening 
for His voice, in order to follow His directions ; in dis- 
cerning His Will, in order to execnte it. The good 
works of Jesns Christ are ail given to Him, one after 



110 THE KEGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



the other, being ail placed on His path before Him, by 
tbe band of God. They folio w eacb otlier so naturally, 
spring up so easily, each front tbe other, tbat they 
never interfère witb eacb other, even on tbe busiest 
days of His ministry. On tbe day, for instance, de- 
scribed in tbe nintb cbapter of St. Mattbew, wben He 
calls one of His Apostles, heals tbe sick, raises a dead 
man, and, on His way, cures a woman diseased many 
years, to say nothing of otber blessings sbowered on 
ail sicles around His patb, tbere was no one instant of 
embarrassment or besitation, eitber as to tbe manner 
of doing His good works, or as to tbe time to be be- 
stowed on eacb, becanse Jésus Christ merely and sim- 
ply followed the will of God, and God took upon Him- 
self to lead Him. Where tbere exists on our part tbis 
perfect accordance witb tbe will of God, then He, on 
His part, shows ns His will with perfect clearness for 
our guidance. Hence we realize tbe wonderful and 
profound words of the Holy Spirit : " We are created 
in Christ Jésus unto good works which God hath before 
ordained, tbat we should walk in them." Good works 
are presented to us, not as a path that we bave to make 
for ourselves, but as a way tbat God bas made for us, 
in which we have only to walk. It is God's way, and 
not our way. We have only to folio w tbis way, and 
each moment we shall be doing the will of God. If I 



THE EEGRETS OF A DYING MAN. Hl 



hâve succeeded in making clear to y ou as well as possi- 
ble, with so little development of the idea, what I wish 
I had done, and what I should désire to do if life were 
restored to me, it will be easy to show liow many ad- 
vantages are offered by this conformity to God's plan 
for us, over any, even the best, personal plan of our 
own. I must, however, add that my idea is not to dis- 
courage personal plans, whicli we ought to endeavor 
to render the best possible. I believe that our infirm- 
ity requires their aid, but we must see that they are 
subordinated to the one gênerai thought of following 
only the will of God. 

To confine myself, then, to two or three leading 
ideas, this path, of which Jésus Christ has given us the 
example, is, in the first place, a condition of holiness. 
What is it that constitutes sin in its subtlest essence ? 
It is self — self-seeking, confidence in self; our own 
will ; justice to self, our own glory, and ail else that 
pertains to ourselves personally. Hence our desires to 
do good, and even to do our Lord's will, if based upon 
plans and projects formed by ourselves, partake inevi- 
tably, in one way or the other, of the root of sin : while, 
on the contrary, as the very essence of holiness is the 
oneness of our will with the Divine will, when we 
have no other plan than God's plan for us, no other 
will than His will, then it is that we shall attain to a 



112 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

true sanctity, not in outward appearance alone, but in 
real cliaracter — a holiness resenibling that of Jésus. 
The holiness of Jésus Christ follows and dépends upon 
the principle I have just laid down, naniely, the con- 
tinuai surrender of His will to the will of God alone, 
manifested within by the testimony of His Spirit, and 
without by the déclarations of His "Word and the signs 
of His Providence. Jésus is holy, because He wills 
only what God wills ; because He seeks not His own 
glory, but that of the Father : in this lay the power 
of His holiness. 

Conformity to God's plans for us, then, is a con- 
dition of holiness. 

At the same time it is a condition of active useful- 
ness. We lose time prodigiously, when we search for 
ourselves, even after good. We consider, and with 
reason, how easy it is for us to deceive ourselves ; we 
involve ourselves in reflections and considérations in- 
finité in variety. And how many men, at the end of 
their career, have recognized that a large part of their 
life has been devoted to forming plans, which would 
have been far more usefully employed in the work of 
the présent moment, and in the interest of others ! 
You see what activity was imparted to the life of our 
Lord by His plan, of which I have spoken. In the 
ninth chapter of St. Matthew, and elsewhere, His good 



THE KEGRETS OF A DYINGr M AN. 



113 



works are crowded togetlier in handfuls, not upon each 
other, in confusion, but following each after tlie other ; 
and there are no limits to the activity of a life founded 
upon an entire accordance with the will of God. The 
action of man becomes then divine action, and our life 
becomes divine life in the midst of a humanity in 
which something of the power of God is accomplished. 
¥e can forai no idea of how much we could do, if we 
were entirely given up to a perfect accordance with 
the will of God ; if we sought no other will than His 
will ; if every word from our mouth, every pulsation 
of our heart, every thought of our mind, every inove- 
ment of our spirit or our body, were turned toward 
Him, waiting, as Samuel did, for His voice : " Speak, 
Lord, for Thy servant heareth." Some have shown 
what man can do. Luther, Calvin, St. Paul, Moses, 
for example, have shown what man can do, when he 
seeks the will of God alone. Jésus Christ did much 
more, because in His case only was there perfect con- 
formity of will to the Divine will. 

It is, then, a condition of active usefulness almost 
limitless ; still there are limits, because God never de- 
mands from His créatures more than they are able to 
perforai. And, lastly— for I stop here— it is a con- 
dition of peace. 

There is no peace possible for the man who takes 



114 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

his career into his own hands. There is always reason 
to fear that lie may deceive himself. He is troubled, 
and often in error, because human will and humanin- 
terest are always subject to much error. He can enjoy 
no repose, but agitâtes and torments himself, and in- 
spires deep compassion in others, who, seeing how pure- 
ly he desires to glorify God, see at the same time how 
he heaps up obstacles in his own path by his want of 
simplicity. 

When, on the other hand, we look to God alone, 
we cast ail onr burdens upon Him, and He will sns- 
tain us ; and, further, if my plans are made trusting 
only in myself, they may not be practicable. I may 
wish to follow a career involving expense for which I 
am not able to provide. I may désire to be a painter, 
and my sight fail me ; an orator, and lose my voice, or 
a surgeon, and my hand tremble ; and so my career is 
a failure, and I am fore ver inconsolable. But there 
would be no such thing as a wrecked career if my pro- 
jects were formed and carried out according to God's 
plan in my behalf. The very impossibility, which 
meets me, of doing that which I had at first proposed 
to myself, proves to me that that is not what God has 
called me to do ; and the very imfirmities which hin- 
der me are so many lights, by which God reveals to 
me my true field of labor. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 115 

If we act in this spirit (I say it with profound 
respect), our work becomes God's affair ratlier than 
our own ; His work, and not ours ; and tlie activity 
and personal energy, which God requires of us always, 
consist simply in following Him in faithful obédience 
and abandonnant of self. 

Hère is profound and perfect peace. God cannot 
lead us astray. We are often disturbed by the thought 
that we are not doing enougli, or that we are doing 
wrong, or not doing the work which God lias given us 
to do. 

I remember, particularly, the first few weeks after 
the physicians had pronounced their opinion in my 
case, how much I was troubled at the thought that my 
work was not done. By God's grâce, I have been 
freed from this thought, because I have been brought 
to understand that it is not a question of my work, but 
God's work ; and I recognized, by the very sufferings 
and afflictions which He h as sent me, and by the hope 
of the eternal life that is to corne after, that the Lord 
has given me another ministry, of more importance, 
probably, than the one I had proposed to myself, and 
certainly surer, because coming to me more directly 
from the hand of God, Who in His mercy compels me 
to walk in this path, for His service and for His glory. 

Then we shall be able to say with the dying Christ. 



116 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

" I bave finished tlie work wHcli Thou gavest me to 
do." "Why could He say tliis ? Because He seeks only 
to clo thé will of God, and God takes Him, as one gatliers 
ripe fruit, as soon as His mission is accomplished. 

In the same way, let us also endeavor to perform 
tlie work which our Father bas given us to do, and 
leave ourselves entirely in His hands, and we too, if 
we are faithful, skall not be taken away until our work 
is finished. It belongs to God alone to décide wben 
tbe work is finished wbich He cbooses to do througb 
our agency. Certainly, in tbe eyes of men, it will be 
very incomplète and very imperfect, but, if we are rigbt 
witb Him, tbe Lord will not permit our life to pass 
without leaving some traces upon eartb. He will not 
take us until our work is done before Him, and we 
sball be able to say witb our Saviour, in a spirit of 
bumility, "I bave finished the work whicb Tbou 
gavest me to do." Vin et said it witbout knowing it, 
wben be gave his last lesson on tbeology from tbe 
words, " I bave finished tbe work which Thou gavest 
me to do ; " and what was accomplished in the case of 
Yinet was at the same time accomplished in Rocbat, 
and is accomplished in every true servant of God. 

There is great peace in seeking our plan of life only 
from God, and in following it witb entire renunciation 
of self. Otherwise there is no peace. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. H7 



Let us apply ourselves to look to God alone, to dé- 
termine the course of our life, those of us who are 
called to bow in humiliation, and those who live to 
grow in grâce. In this spirit let us apply ourselves to 
folio w Jésus Christ to Gethsemane, and to keep our 
eyes constantly fixed upon the will of the Father. 
This will be for us, even as it was for Jésus Christ, a 
source of holiness, of activity in Christian duty, and of 
profound peace. 

May that peace be with you ! I should be very 
happy to think that thèse few remarks may have in- 
duced some who have still time, life, and strength be- 
fore them, so to use them, so faithfully and so simply, 
for the glory of God, after the example of their Sav- 
iour, that they, in their turn, may also say : " I have 
hnished the work which Thou gavest me to do." 

May they pass the rest of their life on earth in per- 
fect peace, until called to the présence of the Father, 
by the grâce of the Lord and by the power and unc- 
tion of the Holy Ghost ! 



XV. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING M AN. 

II. — THE STUDY OF THE WOED OF GOD. 
(January 20, 1856.) 

Followtng out, my dear friends, the order of ideas 
commenced last Sunday, npon the subject of the "re- 
grets of a dying man," and the new view which he 
takes of much in his past life, one of the most impor- 
tant points he wonld wish had been otherwise, and 
that he wonld désire to correct, if he were recalled 
from the half-open door of the tomb, is the manner in 
which he had stndied the Word of God. Ah ! he cer- 
tainly says to himself, then, " How differently I should 
hâve acted in regard to the Word of God ! I onght to 
haye stndied it mnch more deeply, and acquainted 
myself with it far more fully, in order the better to be 
able myself to practise its precepts, and at the same 
time the better to commnnicate it to others ! " 

Let ns fix onr attention for a few short moments 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 119 

upon tliis salutary thought, to bring humility to tliose 
of us wlio are near tlie end of time, and for the édifica- 
tion of those to wliom time is yet given — for how long, 
they know not. 

What, then, is Holy Script ure ? Man will never be 
able to explain how it bas been formed ; particularly 
how the Spirit of God combined with the spirit of 
man, to make of it, at once, a divine work, lofty as the 
heavens, at the same time that it is entirely hum an 
and very near to us ail. This is no less difficult to ex- 
plain than the union of the divine and human nature 
in the person of our Lord Jésus Christ. The compari- 
son is not mine, but is found in Holy Writ, which calls 
itself the written Word, and calls Jésus Christ the Liv- 
ing Word. 

However it may have been formed, Holy Scripture 
is the language of heaven spoken upon earth ; the 
maxims of the kingdom of heaven imparted to man in 
human language, as if the invisible kingdom had de- 
scended into our midst, and lay open before our eyes. 
There is no other book, even among the very best, 
which communicates to us the mysteries of God's 
kingdom. Ail others are full of human error. Script- 
ure alone is exempt. It is the book of God, filled full 
with His trnth. We hear God speaking in it, by His 
Iloly Spirit. We see in it God, and man, the présent 



120 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING M AN. 



and the future, time and eternity, described just as they 
are. When we thus realize what Holy Scripture is, it 
will not be difficult to acknowledge our duty to avail 
ourselves of it. "We ought to interrogate Scripture, as 
we would ask questions of an angel sent expressly from 
heaven by God to instruct us ; or, far better still, as we 
sliould question our Lord Jésus Christ, if we had Him 
with ns tliis moment ; if we could speak to Him and 
hear Him. In point of fact, we do speak to Him, and 
we do hear Him, when we read tlie Holy Scriptures. 
As they reveal Him to us, so also they reveal ail things 
by His Holy Spirit and in His name. Ah ! how can 
we treat this Holy Book with sufficient attention and 
respect? The Bible is not, in itself, of course, the 
the truth which saves us, but it is the way to it. It is 
not our salvation, bnt it is the book which reveals our 
salvation to ns ; without which we shonld never have 
known it, and by which, in the proportion that we are 
better acquainted with it, we shall also grow in the 
knowledge of our Lord Jésus Christ, the Saviour of 
onr soûls. ]STo Christian will contest the truth of thèse 
principles, and yet, how very rare are those who pro- 
fonndly study the Scriptures ! Most read thein super- 
ficially and confine themselves to the study of a few 
great gênerai truths, instead of penetrating always 
deeper and deeper, and, as far as possible, grasping ail 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



121 



that is to be found ; as it is written : " The secret 
things belong unto the Lord our God : but those things 
which are revealed belong unto us and to our ehildren 
forever." 

"Whence, then, tbis singular inconsistency in us? 
Tbe reason is, because of the difficulties which the 
Bible présents to us ; and it must be confessed that, at 
the outset, we do find much that is difficult and ob- 
scure ; and so, as it requires time and labor to remove 
thèse difficulties, and the mind of man being naturally 
idle and slothful, little by little we lose courage, and 
though we continue to read over and over again, still 
we confine ourselves to the same uniform amount of 
labor and study, hardly ever penetrate below the sur- 
face, never learn any thing new, and going always 
over the same thing, we feel at times a certain degree 
of fatigue, as if the Word of God were not interesting, 
as if it were not capable of instructing us for ever and 
ever, as if it were not inexhaustible as God Himself ! 

Let us never allow ourselves to believe that the 
difficulties are invincible. ]STo, my friends ; but we 
must take pains ; and here, as well as in prayer, and 
in every other duty of the Christian life, God desires 
that man be a worker with Him. Knowledge of the 
Bible and taste for the Bible are the fruit and the 
recompense of humble, sincère, and persevering labor. 
6 



122 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

Ali ! may eacb one of y ou return to His Bible 
with new ardor ! Study book after book, not merely 
with a view of acquiring gênerai sentiments of piety, 
but to gain a profound and growing knowledge of the 
kingdoni of beaven. Study one book until you bave 
understood it as well as possible for you to do, tben 
pass on to a second, a tbird, and so on ; and you will 
find, after a second or tbird reading, many difiiculties 
will vanisb, wbicb at first seemed insurniountable ; 
and if even some still remain, you will none tbe less 
reap tbe fruit of tbe labor you bave perforai ed before 
tbe eyes of God. Do not except from tbis careful 
study, even tbe most difficult books, tbe propbets, tbe 
lesser propbets, wbicb many Cbristians leave aside as 
un intelligible. If you will only give yourselves tbe 
trouble to study tbem, you will find mucb tbat is most 
interesting. Tbere are besides, tbrougb tbe goodness 
of God, excellent books, good commentaries upon cer- 
tain parts of Scripture, wbicb may serve as a key to 
otber parts ; and witb tbe belp of sucb good books, we 
can penetrate deeper and deeper into tbe knowledge 
of tbe word of God. And tben, we must apply our- 
selves cbiefly to tbose parts of tbe Book wbicb address 
tbemselves more particularly to Cbristians, but, I 
repeat, witbout neglecting any part. Tbe fruit and 
tbe recompense of tbose wbo will be tbus faitbful and 



THE KEGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 123 

persevering, will be to understand tlie Word of God, to 
love it, to enter more profoundly into its hidden mean- 
ings, and to find the time always too short to become 
well acquainted with it. I knew a man who spent 
seven tours every day in tlie stud y of the Bible, and 
who found ever-increasing charm in his work. 

If any one of us, making use of ail the resources 
which God has placed within his reach, in faith, and 
trusting in God to lead him, would carry out the 
thoughts which I have now only been able to indicate, 
he will find in the Word of God treasures which he had 
never before suspected. It will become a stay and 
support to him as firm as it was to Jésus tempted in 
the désert ; it will be to him what it was to the saints 
of the New Testament, and what the portions existing 
before them were to the Old Testament saints also ; 
what it was to David; what it was to Daniel ; what 
it was to St. Paul and to ail "the saints of God. 

May God give us ail the grâce to do this ! May 
He, to whom it is no more difficult to bless in a short 
space of time, than after much time; with great 
power, than with little power; may He grant that the 
words I have said to you may so sink into your hearts, 
that they may effect a change in your reading and 
study of the Bible, for which you will bless God to ail 
eternity ! Amen ! 



XVI. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING M AN. 

m. — ON THE EMPLOTMENT OF ÏTME. 
(January 27, 1856.) 

My strength is exhausted, dear friends, and I hâve 
asked myself whether it would not be better to omit 
my address this time. I will endeavor, however, to 
say wbat I bad intended to say, but must limit myself 
to merely indicating my thoughts. 

One of tbe tbings tbat trouble tbe Christian wbo 
believes himself near his end, or rather would trouble 
him if he were not at the foot of tbe cross, is tbe man- 
ner in wbicb be bas employed bis time. Tins, tben, is 
one of tbe warnings wbicb be ougbt to address to bis 
living bretbren. It is written, " Redeem tbe oppor- 
tunity." Tbis is more exact tban tbe received version, 
" Redeem tbe time." Tbe meaning is, embrace witb 
eagerness tbe opportunity wbicb God gives us, because 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 125 

the days are evil, and an opportunity once neglected 
may never occnr again. The idea of the proper em, 
ployaient of tiaie is ia itself so grand that it affrights 
our soûls, and we might express the thought some- 
thing more modestly by sayiag : " Seize with avidity 
ail opportunities which God seads ns ia the order ia 
which He preseats them." How mnch time, how 
rnaay opportuaities are lost by idleness, iucredulity, by 
aegligeace, egotism, followiag our owa will, by iade- 
c'sioa, attachaieat to siu, aad by a thousaad other 
causes ! It is uot uecessary to dwell upoa this, for 
there is no Christian whose heart does not condemn 
him aad whose coascieace is not tronbled in this 
regard. Ah ! how precious and how ample is the 
time that God gives us ! He, the just Oue, measures 
our time by our work, aad our work by our time, aad 
aever gives us a good work to do for which time is 
wautiug, uor a siugle momeat of our existeace ia 
which we have uot somethiug good to do. How, thea, 
can we succeed in thus fllling up our whole time, and 
in doiag at least a part of the immeuse amouut of good 
which a siugle mau could accomplish, if he would put 
ia practise the precept, " Whatsoever thy hand findeth 
to do, do it with thy might," aad if he were coa- 
staatly occupied in the service of the Lord ? I désire 
to olfer you two or three suggestions, and leave to your 



126 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



own consciences the task of developing tliem more 
thoroughly : 

1. First, we must be quite persuaded of the truth 
that we do not belong to ourselves, and that our time 
is no more our own tlian any thing else we may pos- 
sess. Our time is God's, and we must therefore always 
look to Him for wliat we are to do to fill up tlie time 
that lie gives us, and to respond to the opportunities 
which He présents to us» I assure you that sickness 
gives us very precious lessons on this subject. It 
teaches us, I mean, that we do not belong to ourselves, 
but to God. Our own heart is naturally prone to con- 
stitue itself the centre and the object of our life, and 
this is the very root of sin. But when we are ill, when 
we suffer, how can we find consolation, if we seek the 
aim of our life in ourselves ? Our life's aim lias then 
completely failed, and sickness teaches us to seek it 
elsewhere. It teaches us that we do not live to be 
happy on earth, but to glorify God ; and this we can 
do as well, and often better, in sickness than in health. 
Let us learn, then, from sickness, and from ail the suf- 
ferings of life, as well as from the whole Word of God, 
that our whole time belongs to God, and that our duty 
is to employ it wholly for His glory. 

2. We must be ever eager to embrace the oppor- 
tunities which God présents to us. They will not be 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



127 



wanting, and we sliall find a path of life beibre us, ail 
interwoven with good works ready prepared for us; 
and ail we hâve to do, is to walk in this path. The 
works will link themselves together, and each will so 
easily and naturally suggest others, that our life will 
become one good work, namely obédience, and conse- 
quently, as we heard just now, peace and joy, by the 
Holy Ghost. In order to this, we must keep our eyes 
constantly open and turned toward God, saying to 
Him, "Lordbehold me, what wilt Thou hâve me to 
•do % " and then when one thing is done, " Lord, what 
wilt Thou that I do next \ " without any interval of 
time not eutirely filled up with the obédience due to 
God. He will give us opportunities of doing, by de- 
grees, an incalculable amount of good. One cannot 
estimate the amount of well-doing which may enter 
into and form the life of one single man who is thus 
disposed to act. 

Look at the life of Jésus Christ as Man. In the 
things of this world, too, those who have accomplished 
the most, are the m en who lived upon the principle of 
seizing opportunities as offered them. If you study 
carefully the lives of men whose works have been nu- 
merous and wide-spread — Calvin for example, or Luther, 
or Bossuet — you will observe that they did ail that 
was presented to them, and as it was presented to them 



128 



THE REGRETS OF A DYIXG MAN. 



on tlieir path through life. You will note that oppor- 
" tunity summoned thèse men, gradually, to do ail that 
they have done ; as Bossuet was led to compose his 
best works by the edncational requirements of his 
pupil the dauphin, and the best writings of Calvin 
and Luther were also the resuit of circumstances. On 
the other hand, ordinary men who accomplish but lit- 
tle are those who do not know how to grasp oppor- 
tunités and profit by them. They might, perhaps, be 
able to accomplish quite as much as those who have 
done the most, but they have not the art of availing 
them sel ves of opportunities. The true art of embrac- 
ing opportunities, is the Christian art of keeping our 
eyes turned always to the Lord, of accepting each duty 
as He présents it to us, and, when that is done, then 
passing on to another. It is wonderful how much a 
single human life can accomplish in this manner, by 
simply following the path which the Lord opens before 
the eyes of each one of us. 

3. ¥e must work with method, according to rule, 
and leave nothing to chance, in the employaient of the 
time which God has given us. I said, a few days ago, 
that we must not make our plans for ourselves, but 
there is nothing contradictory in saying that we must 
act methodically, provided that we seek our method in 
the Lord. To do what God gives us to do 3 we must 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



129 



employ System and regularity. Thus it is proper that 
we should hâve fixed hours for rising in tlie morning, 
fixed hours assigned to daily labor, and should be 
as exact as possible in the hours of our meals, and of 
ail our various daily occupations. Our life then be- 
comes simpler, pleasanter, and more easy to fill up 
with its duties. It is, as it were, a frarnework, ail 
prepared and ready, upon which the Lord has only to 
act His will. The men who have done the most are 
those who have understood how to regulate their life 
strictly and tranquilly ; especially if they have been 
able to add, to their systematic steadiness, animation 
of spirit and warmth of soul. Thèse qualities do not 
usually accompany order and method, but, when the 
combination exists, it renders a man capable of an as- 
tonishing amount of work. It is said that the philoso- 
pher Kant took pleasure in appealing to his servant to 
testify that, for forty years, he h ad risen every day at 
four o'clock in the morning. Think for a moment of 
the amount of work a man can get through, who rises 
every morning at four o'clock ! And see, besides, the 
power of method, independently of the hour of rising. 
From the mere fact that we have a fixed hour, how 
much more time do we have, to consecrate to the Lord, 
for this simple reason : if I rise every day at a fixed 
time, I have adopted this hour, with prayer, before 



130 THE EEGRETS OF A DYING M AN. 

God, wbile bearing in mind, of course, tbe suggestions 
of Cbristian wisdom and prudence. If, on tbe otber 
band, I leave my bour of rising to cbance, it is deter- 
mined. by tbe impulse of tbe moment, tbat is to say, 
by various circumstances wbicb I ougbt to be able to 
control ; it will dépend upon laziness, upon my désire 
for " a little slumber, a little folding of tbe bands to 
sleep ; so sball tby poverty corne as one tbat trav- 
elletb ; " a poverty not only of gold, but of spirit, of 
work, and of tbe service of God. Thus tben, metbod, 
a lite peacefully ordered as before tbe Lord, is a mat- 
ter of tbe bigbest importance to teacb us to do mu 3b 
for tbe service of God. 

And, lastly, not to multiply our renections, let us 
keep our bodies and our spirits in such condition tbat 
tbey offer no obstacle to tbe proper employment of our 
rime, and of tbe gifts wbicb we bave received to be 
used according to tbe will of God. Sadness, inequal- 
ity of spirits or temper, tbe bias of our own will, 
tbougbts of self, désire of tbe glory of men — tbese are 
ail so many obstacles wbicb surround us and plague us 
witbout ceasing, and we must apply ourselves to con- 
trol and defeat tbem. 

Nor must we neglect tbe body. Bad bealtb or a 
feeble frame often tbrows great obstacles in tbe way 
of tbe accomplisbment of our work before God. We 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



131 



must accept it, wlien God sends it, but it is our duty, 
before Him, to take ail tlie exercise necessary for tbe 
body, and ail requisite précautions to strengtlien it, for 
tlie service and glory of God. Tliis tbougbt élevâtes 
and sanctifies ail our actions. There are many wbo 
would bave been able to accomplisb a great deal more 
for tbe glory of God, had tbey not been carried away 
by an energy and activity, pious indeed, but unreflect- 
ing, wliicli wore them out while still young. Tbose 
wbo die early bave to examine tbemselves, wbetber 
they bave not neglected certain simple précautions, 
easy in tbemselves, but difïicult to persévère in, wbicb 
would bave enabled tbem to work longer in God's 
service. 

But, above ail, let us strengtben our spirits and 
soûls, and avoid ail tbat is calcul ated to impede any 
work tbat God desires to accomplisb in us or by our 
means. 

My dear friends, we none of us know bow mucb 
time we bave remaining, but we do know wbat we 
bave bad, and bow mucb we bave to reproacb our- 
selves for tbe use we bave made of it. Let us seize 
tben, eagerly, upon ail tbat is still left ûs, whetber we 
be strong or feeble, ill or well, living or dying. We 
bave a Saviour wbo spent every instant of His life on 
eartb, in obédience to God. Let us walk in His foot- 



132 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

steps, by the cross, to glory, and at the end we shall 
hear the sweet words : " Well done, good and faithful 
servant, thou hast been faithful over a few things, I 
will make thee ruler over many things." 



XVII. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

IV. — PEAYEE. 

(February 3, 1856.) 

My dear friends in Christ, among the subjects upon 
which the dying Christian would dwell, as lie ap- 
proaches his end, there is doubtless nothing that he 
would more regret and more earnestlj désire to reform, 
if life were spared him, than his manner of prayer. 

What is prayer in reality, and what is it in the prac- 
tice of most Christians % I say of believing, praying 
Chris tians. A few moments in the morning consecrated 
to retirement, and a few moments in the evening ; more 
or less long, more or less short — sometimes very short ; 
and, now and then, a lifting up the soul to Gôd under 
extraordinary circumstances which bring the feeling 
of an especial need of approaching Him. To thèse 
meagre proportions are reduced the daily habits of 



134 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

many Christians, or men calling themselves Christians. 
How few, therefore, of the fruits of prayer, so often 
promised in Scripture, are known to most of us ! 
Where are the powerful fruits of sanctification, making 
the soul triumph over ail temptation, like Jésus in the 
désert, which u ruake us more than conquerors through 
Him who loved us ? " Where are ail the fruits of con- 
solation, spreading abroad in the heart a joy so sweet 
and profound, able to rise superior to ail afflictions of 
earth, even ail the bitternesses and anguish of heart, 
spirit, and flesh, enabling us to rejoice always with that 
perfect joy which the dying Jésus wished for His dis- 
ciples, who were entering upon lives of suffering and 
trial unto death ? "Where are the fruits of deliverance, 
when the soul obtains from God ail it asks for, whether 
it says, with Jésus, "I know that Thou hearest me 
always ; " or, not able to rise so high, it may say, 
at least, with David, " Thou wilt hear, O Lord my 
God ! " 

Let us be sincère. We must admit that, between 
the Scripture promises made to prayer, and the fruits 
which we receive from prayer, there is so wide a dis- 
tance that our faith is often troubled, and at moments 
even perhaps shaken, and we have asked ourselves, " Is 
this ail ? " !N"o, it is not ail that has been promised us, 
but then we have not done ail that has been com- 



THE KEGKETS OF A DYING MAN. 135 

manded us. Ah ! my friends, prayer, as I liave been 
sketcliing it from Nature, is a very différent thing from 
prayer as presented to us by Scripture, the prayer to 
which ail the promises are made ! 

Prayer, accordiug to Scripture, what is it not ? I 
said, a few days ago, that the Holy Scripture, the Word 
of God, is heaven in words ; and, following out the 
same image, I might say that prayer, as understood by 
Scripture, is heaven in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. 
Without the Word, prayer becomes naught, having 
nothing to feed upon ; without prayer, the Word is 
powerless and does not penetrate into the heart. But 
when the truths of heaven, with which Holy Scripture 
is filled, are received and assimilated into the very sub- 
stance of our soûls by prayer, and penetrate even to 
the depths and vitals of our inner man, then we know 
and feel that prayer brings heaven within us, and ail 
its blessings, the Holy Spirit and ail His grâce, God 
and ail His promises. 

Prayer is the key which God has placed in our 
hands to put us into communication with the invisible 
world. Every thing is ours through prayer ; and, with- 
out prayer, nothing. It is, I say, a key which God 
has placed in our hands; for there is another key 
which He has kept in His own. He deigns to use it 
sometimes, to open the invisible world for us, when we 



136 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



have neglected to open for ourselves, to put ourselves 
into communication witli Him, and act in unison with 
His divine action, as it is written, " ¥e are fellow- 
workers witli God." God struck down Saul on the 
road to Damascus, and raised him up another man. 
He opened heaven to him at a time when, far from 
seeking it, he was searching for the disciples of Christ 
to torture and kill them. But we are not' to count 
upon such instances of grâce as this, and they would 
be ail the less granted to us, if we did count upon 
them. Doubtless, if we think well on the subject, we 
may fmd at bottom, in cases of such manifestation of 
Divine grâce, a sincère désire in the soul to search 
after God. This very Saul of Tarsus, who went about 
persecuting the name of Jésus in His people, had nev- 
ertheless a heart sincerely seeking for God, and pray- 
ing Him to be led into the truth. Perhaps the spark 
of a new life began to penetrate his soul from the 
moment that holy Stephen prayed for those who were 
murdering him. "Who can tell ? 

However this may be, the ordinary way of God is 
to grant His grâce to prayer, and to wait for prayer 
before He does grant it. Isaiah says, " Therefore will 
the Lord wait that He may be gracious unto you." 
What will He wait for? He waits until you have 
cried unto Him. And in Jeremiah, " Te shall go and 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 137 

pray unto Me, and I will hearken unto you, and ye 
shall seek Me and find Me, when ye shall search for 
Me with ail your heart." It is the same thing with us 
now. By prayer we can obtain ail things, and to real, 
true prayer, as described in Scripture, ail the promises 
are made. 

Prayer, my friends, is the distinctive mark of the 
mighty servants of the Lord. With considérable différ- 
ences, they ail présent this common feature. They ail 
pray much, and pray ardently. Remember the pray- 
ers of Jacob ; he strives and wrestles with the Lord for 
a whole night, nntil he triumphs over the Lord Ilim- 
self who lends Himself to this triumph, as an exercise 
of His servant's faith. Look at the prayers of Moses 
and of Samuel — of Moses the founder, and of Samuel 
the reformer of Israël. Jeremiah says, at the begin- 
ning of his fifteenth chapter, to show that God was 
determined not to grant a certain favor : " Though 
Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could 
not be toward this people." Let us try to substitute 
our own name for that of Moses or Samuel : if such 
and such a one of us had prayed, this thing would not 
be granted ! . . What a fall ! what humiliation ! what 
absurdity ! Take the prayers of David, the Psalms ; 
prayers compétent not only to support him in his 
troubles, but are as if one hundred and fifty pillars 



138 THE KEGKETS OF A DYING MAN. 



wliicli from génération to génération liave supported, 
and will support unto the end of the world, ail the 
générations of the people of God ! Look at the prayers 
of King Jehoshaphat, who destroyed by prayer alone 
the combined arrnies of the Moabites, the Ammonites, 
and the inhabitants of Mount Seir ; and of King Heze- 
kiah, his great-grandson and imitator, who by prayer 
alone calls down from an avenging God ntter exter- 
mination upon an army of a hnndred and eighty-five 
thousand meu, who were only waiting to raze Jérusa- 
lem to its foundations ! Look at the prayers of ïfehe- 
miah and Esdras, for the élévation and reformation of 
their people, after the example of Moses and Samuel ; 
the one by improving their spiritual condition and 
their observance of the law, the other by rebuilding 
the walls of Jérusalem and reëstablishing its civil gov- 
ernment. Look at the prayers of Jésus, " the author 
and linisher of our faith," who though He was Jésus 
the Christ, the Son of the living God, prays without 
ceasing, passes whole nights in prayer, and does noth- 
ing without prayer. He appoints His twelve apostles 
after prayer, and supports and encourages them by 
prayer. He triumphs by prayer over the démon in 
the désert, in Gethsemane, and at Golgotha. He ac- 
complishes the entire work of our rédemption by 
prayer, having been made thereby capable of enduring 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING M AN. 



139 



the most unheard-of anguish, of which our intensest 
sufferings are hardly sufficient to give us the faintest 
idea. Folio wing in the steps of Jésus, the ranks of 
praying m en recommence. St. Paul, what a giant in 
prayer ! Prayer is the very soul and main- spring of 
ail his work. Prayer makes him more especially what 
he is. See the prayers of St. Augustine, of Calvin, 
and Luther. When Luther appeared before the Diet 
of "Worms, he passed three hours of the best part of 
the day in crying to God with a loud voice ; little 
thinking that his faithful friend Dietrich was indis- 
creetly listening to him and preserving his glowing 
prayers for the good of the Church. 1 

1 Dietrich wrote to Melancthon (Schreiben an Ph. Melancthon, Walch, 
Theil xvL, p. 2139), speaking of Luther at Coburg, during the Augs- 
burg Diet : "I cannot sufficiently admire his firmness, his joy, his faith, 
and his hope, in this time of désolation. He strengthens himself every 
day in thèse feelings by constant recourse to the Word of God. Not a 
day passes without his reserving, for prayer, at îeast three hours, from the 
part of the day most favorable for work. One day, I had the privilège 
of hearing him pray. Great God ! what spirit, what faith in his words ! 
He prays with ail the devoutness of a man feeling himself in God's prés- 
ence, but with ail the confidence of a child speaking to his father. ' / 
Hcnow,' 1 he said, ' that Thou art our good God and our Father ; and that 
is why I am persuaded that Thou wilt destrou those who persécute Thy chil- 
dren. If Thou doest it not, the danger is as much for Thee as for us. 
TJiis cause is Thine own. What we have done, we could not have dune other- 
wise. lt remains for Thee, merciful Father, to protect us. 1 While, from 
a distance, I was listening to him as he prayed in thèse words, with 
clear voice, my heart within me glowed with joy, as I heard him speak- 
ing thus to God, with so much fervor and at the same time so much free- 



140 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



Look at the prayers of Pascal, visited, so young, 
with sufferings so constant and cruel, but enabled to 
rise superior to them with a firmness and a piety 
which we find deeplj impressed on his beautiful and 
powerful prayers, which bave been preserved for us. 
Look at the prayers of ail saints in ail times. Prayer 
is tbeir faith, their life, tbeir spring of action, their 
whole work. 

O rny friends, I do not know if you feel as pro- 
foundly bumbled as I do, by remembering ail this. 
For my part, I cannot express the depth of my humili- 
ation in recalling what my prayers have been, in com- 
parison with what they ought to have been and might 
have been. Certainly, in our humble sphère of action, 
we should have been what ail thèse men were in the 
history of Scripture and of the Church, if we had 
known how to pray as they prayed ; if, instead of say- 
ing that it was a spécial privilège granted by God to 
them, we could say, " Lord, teach me to pray ! " 

Ah ! if I were to return to life, with the help of 
God, and in distrust of myself, I would dévote much 
more time to prayer than to work ; though we must 
not neglect work either, but it only gains power when 

dom. He built his hopes iu particular so firmly upon the promises of 
the Psalms, that he seemed quite assured that nothing he asked for could 
fail of accomplishment." 



THE KEGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 141 



sustained and animated by prayer. Above ail, I would 
désire to feel in my prayers the unction and fervor of 
the Holy Spirit. Tins is not to be learned in a day, 
but is the fruit of a long and sometimes painful expé- 
rience. 

O my friends, you who are full of life; whose 
career seems far from its close — though what can we 
know ? I may live longer than you — embrace the op- 
portunity and redeem it. Form new habits of prayer. 
With the spirit of fervor, infuse into your prayers a 
spirit of order and method, which will increase their 
power, as it increases the power of ail human things, 
and coopérâtes with the Divine power itself. Imitate 
the order and method of which Jésus Christ has given 
us an example in the model prayer, the Lord's prayer. 

Finally, entreat God to lead you, aud go from 
hence filled with the supplication, " Lord, teach us to 
pray !" I will do the same thing, however short my 
time may be. God does not look at the shortness or 
length of our time, but at the désire of our hearts. 
Let us strive, ail together, animated by the same spirit, 
and with hearts humbled by the weakness and languor 
of our prayers, let us form the holy resolution to know 
at last for ourselves, by our own personal expérience, 
what the real and true promises are, that we may 
receive the blessed héritage in that invisible world, 



142 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MÀN. 



with winch prayer alone, by the TTord cf God, can put 
us into communication. The invisible world, nearer 
to some and farther from others than they think or 
^vish, will open to us ail, old and young, in ten, twen- 
ty 3 fifty, or a hundred years (that would be enorrnously 
long) ; that is to say, " in the twinkling of an eye." 
It will open to ail those of us who hâve placed their 
entire hope in Christ crucified and raised from the 
dead. This is my prayer for you ail, and, when the 
Lord calls me to Himself, it is the héritage T désire to 
leave to my dear family, and to each one of you! 
Amen. 



XVIII. 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

V. — OVER-INTEREST IN THE LESSER CONCERTS OF LIEE. 
(February 10, 1856.) 

You give me a new proof of brotherly affection, my 
dear friends,in again partaldng, with me, of our Lord's 
feast of love. 

One of the tbings wbich would afflict tbe soul of a 
man who is looking at death from a very near point of 
yiew (if, indeed, in this, as in every otlier regret, he 
were not comforted by tlie free grâce of God in Jésus 
Christ), is the memory of tbe part of bis life lost, if 
not worse tban lost, in tbe comparatively trifling corn 
cerns of life, instead of being occnpied witb tbe great 
and important interests wbicb ought to be always be- 
fore a Christian's eyes. I désire, tberefore, to cali y our 
attention for a moment to tbe great evil tbere is in 
tbe Cbristian's allowing bimself to be preoccupied 



144 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



witli interests of minor importance. First, I must 
explain that préoccupation with snialler interests 
must not be confounded with attention bestowed on 
small things. ¥e are called upon by God to busy our- 
selves with a multitude of little things ; life, indeed, is 
made up of them. The manner in winch we perform 
our small duties is as faithful, and often a more faith- 
ful, test of our piety, than our manner of fulfilling our 
greater duties ; because, in the case of the former, we 
have no other witnesses than God, ourselves, and our 
families ; whereas, in the latter case, we are often placed 
in a sort of théâtre, where our pride finds only too 
often satisfaction in the position. Besides, nothing we 
do is small or great in itself, but only becomes so by 
the spirit which governs our action. In the eyes of 
God, what we call small is as great as what we call 
greatest, and what we call great, as small as what we 
call smallest ; for God is infinité and eternal. A faith- 
ful servant, for example, who, for the love of God's 
sake, takes affectionate care of a child intrusted to her 
by her master, performs a very great deed in the sight 
of God, and it will have its reward. On the other 
hand, the statesman who, impelled by love of self, as- 
pires to the highest honors of wisdom or éloquence, 
performs a very mean act in the sight of God, which 
may draw down upon him more shame in heaven than 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 145 

glory upon earth. The important point is, to infuse 
into ail our actions a large, elevated spirit, looking 
always to God, and doing ail things as in sight of Him, 
and in view of eternity ; keeping God always in our 
hearts, that He may be présent also in our words and 
our works, that there may be nothing small or mean, 
earthly or fleeting, in our entire life. 

The example of God Himself will explain clearly 
what I have said. God makes no différence between 
small things and great in the ordering of His provi- 
dence. He bestows as much care upon the création 
of the minutest plant, and the sm ailes t snow-flake, as 
He does upon the proportions, relations, and move- 
ments of the heavenly bodies ; and whether He créâtes 
a grain of sand, or rears a Mont Blanc, He does it, as 
only He can do it, namely, in perfection, with thor- 
ough care. Moreover, He who finds nothing too in- 
signifiant to command His attention, has eternity, 
His kingdom and His glory before His eyes, as well in 
His lesser as in His greater works ; as He Himself 
said, "The Lord hath made ail things for Himself." 
In ail the works of God, moral or physical, there is 
absolutely nothing in which He has not borne the im- 
mense burden of infinité care and eternal interest. 
The same with Jésus, God made visible. Not only 
does He not neglect the poor little children brought 
1 



146 THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

unto Him, though His apostles thought it beneath 
Him to bless them, but He did not even lose sigbt of 
the fragments of the loaves and fishes, and desired that 
nothing sbould be lost; this, too, when He had just 
shown that at a word, and even witbout a word, He 
could multiply loaves and fishes at His will. This is 
the same Jésus who accomplished the mighty works 
of His incarnation, His Rédemption, His Passion, 
Résurrection, and glorious Ascension. He does ail 
things in the same spirit ; whether He clothes Himself 
in our flesh, or redeems us, or suffers for us ; whether 
He rises from the tomb or mounts to the skies ; 
whether He stops on His way, to bless little children, 
or to command that fragments of bread and fish be 
gathered up, to speak a brief word of consolation to a 
sufferer, or to give a cup of cold water to the thirsty ; 
in each and ail of His acts, He ever keeps in view 
God, eternity, and His Father's glory. Hence it is 
that Jésus Christ appears to us, in ail His works, as 
though His head were in heaven while His feet still 
remain on earth ; speaking of Himself, He says, " He 
who is in heaven." As His soul is ail great, so also 
are ail His works and ail His thoughts. 

Here, then, dear friends, is the example set before 
us ; and in like manner ought we also to walk ; not 
troubled by the small interests of earth, still less by its 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



147 



desires and its sins, but always engrossed by God, by 
His glory, His love, and by the work of Christ, for His 
honor, for our welfare and for that of ail mankind. 

Made in the image and likeness of God, we ought 
to be His imitators, and in our lesser as well as our 
greater efforts, should always keep prédominant the 
thought of God and of eternity. The Christian, what- 
ever he says or does, ought to be always great in the eyes 
of God, who knows how to estimate real greatness. 
The old painters represented the saints with a nimbus 
of light around their heads ; Scripture does nothing of 
the kind, excepting in the case of one saint of the Old 
Testament, and this in an entirely exceptional manner. 
Saints wear their crown of light in themselves, and let 
it beam from within, wherever they go. In like man- 
ner, the Christian must make such an impression upon 
others, that, wherever he is seen, in the street or the 
drawing-room, at table, in prison, or at the very sum- 
mit of human greatness, he may always impress others 
with the feeling that he is a man seeking after God, 
striving for the adv an cernent of the great interests of 
humanity ; who finds it not worth while to live for 
any thing else than to glorify God, and makes ail his 
successes and reverses conduce to this end; who is 
ready to part with his life as soon as his work in this 
direction is accomplished, and, like his Master, goes 



148 THE KEGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 

about from place to place, doing good. Oh, how holy 
would such a Christian be ! how happy ! how free from 
desires, from envy, anxiety, and ail that troubles the 
sonl ! Walking ever with God, what honor would he 
not do to the Gospel! How victoriously would he 
close the mouths of his opponents, and how many soûls 
he would lead to his Saviour, by the humble brilliancy 
of his thoroughly holy life, more effective than his 
most powerful words ! 

But where are such Christians ? O my God, 
where are they ! 

How much easier to find Christians — true, sincère 
Christians, I mean — who, if about to die, would com- 
mend their soûls into the hands of their Saviour, and 
who in the main dépend upon Him, but allow them- 
selves to be turned out of their way and engrossed with 
the lesser interests of life ; by love of money, by thirst 
for the glory of men, by jealousy of a rival's success, 
by ardent désire for personal success, by ambitions 
outside the paths chosen for them by God, by impa- 
tience of ills, répugnance to humiliations and crosses ; 
who allow themselves to be disturbed and irritated in 
temper by a single word, perhaps misunderstood, or by 
an insignifiant act which, when death cornes, and per- 
haps even in an hour's time, will be entirely forgot- 
ten! 



THE REGRETS OF A DYING MAN. 



149 



O my God, how very few are the really consist- 
ent Christians ! My friends, in this way the Gospel 
is comproraised by those who profess to be its fol- 
lowers ; of whom it is so often said, that they pursue, 
after al], only what is pursued by others, and that what 
troubles and annoys others, equally troubles and an- 
noys them. The Gospel is thus injured by those very 
persons who seek in it ail their peace and safety, and 
who ought to employ ail their strength and ail their 
life for its glory, walking with head erect — even like 
Jésus, with their head in heaven though their feet are 
still upon earth ; still breathing in heaven, and finding 
there the source and principle of ail their actions, and 
the whole power of their life. 

If you knew, my friends, how ail illusions are dissi- 
pated when we find ourselves near unto death ; how 
ail that is small then appears small, and ail that then 
seems great is what really is great in the eyes of God ; 
if you knew how you will regret not having lived more 
for God, as. Jésus lived fer ïïim, and if you had to 
begin life again, how earnestly you would désire to 
live in a far more serions manner, more filled with 
J esus Christ, with His word and with His example — 
ah ! if you knew ! — you would this moment put your 
hand to the work ; you would supplicate Gôd to con- 
form your conduct to your feelings and to your faith. 



150 



THE KEGKETS OF A DYING MAN. 



And you would succeed, too — as, after ail, so many 
hâve succeeded before you, because they have cried unto 
God, and have sincerely desired and willed to do so, 
before ïïim. And the little company of God's claildren 
gathered together in this chamber, around my bed of 
siekness, and probably of death — this little band of 
Christians, with ail their infirmities and languor — 
wonld do more for the advancement of the kingdom 
of God and for the good of humanity, than a compact 
crowd invested with ail possible gifts. They would be 
capable of action, great according to the degree that 
they henceforth entirely banish every thought of vain 
personal greatness from their hearts. 

This is my wish for you, and my ardent prayer for 
you. It is also the prayer that I earnestly beg you to 
offer up to God for me ; to the end that, during what- 
ever time may still remain for me, I may have no other 
thought than to live for the glory of God and the 
good of my fellow-men. This will be, at the sarae 
time, to live for my own eternal joy. Amen. 



XIX. 



JESUS CHRIST. 

(February 17, 1856.) 

"When we reflect upon what we hâve just been 
doing, recalling to our minds ail tliat God lias given us 
in His well-beloved Son, we should feel disposed either 
to keep silence, or to add to the solemn service words 
only of adoration and thanksgiving. Since, however, 
the Lord calls upon us to glorify His "Word and to 
bear testimony to its truth, and since in some situations 
our opportunities to do so are ver y rare, I will con- 
tinue, relying upon the help of God, to lay before you 
the truth as I feel it in my heart, until the day corne 
when the Lord shall say to me, as He closes my lips : 
" Enough ! thou hast said enough ! Go, now, and rest 
from.thy labors in the bosom of thy Lord." 

You know I like to speak to you here, under the 
title " The Regrets of a Dying Man," of a Christian's 



152 



JESUS CHRIST. 



views when lie believes himself near his end ; of tlie 
employment lie lias made of his life, or tliat he would 
wish to niake were life continued to him, and that he 
would désire to see made by his brethren still in life. 

But I feel myself especially called upon, in m y 
peculiar situation, and particularly in view of the dark 
and agitated times in which we live, to bear testimony 
to the conclusions to which the Christian life and my 
pastoral ministry in infirmity h ave led me. I désire 
that it be well known and understood in what state 
of feeliog I shall lie down and sleep, when God calls 
me, and that there may be no sort of doubt in the 
minds of my friends and brethren, and of the whole 
Church, upon the subject which forms, now in this mo- 
ment, and, I trust in the goodness of God, will ever 
more and more form, the assurance of my soul. 

There is, first, an important matter upon which I 
do not linger now, as we have lately dwelt upon it at 
sufficient length. I know that my little audience 
changes from week to week, but I cannot do otherwise 
than follow a certain order in the thoughts which I 
express to you. Our first subject was Sin. The first 
point we have to gain is a clear and profound sensé of 
our sinful condition before God. !Not only must we be 
convinced that we have sinned against His holy laws, 
but that we have also begun to realize the enormity of 



JESUS CHKIST. 



153 



sin, the terror of the judgments of God, and the depth 
of the abyss from which we are to be saved. Once 
persuaded of the whole bitterness of sin, withont extén- 
uation, withont explanation or excuse of any sort, 
onlj saying, " Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned," 
the entire Gospel is summed up for us, my dear friends, 
and particularly for me at this moment, in a single 
word, or rather in a single name, Jésus Christ — as St. 
Paul says to us: " For I determined not to know any 
thing among you, save Jésus Christ, and Him cruci- 
fied." 

Who is Jésus Christ % What is He ? What idea 
have you formed of Him ? IIow would you reply to 
His question, " Whom say ye that I am?" Here is 
the foundation and beginning of our faith. (O my 
God ! strengthen my heart and my lips, that, in my 
affliction, I may glorify Thee !) 

In contemplating Jésus, we see Him first as man, 
but very soon perceive that He is no ordinary man. 
We find in Him an infinité charity, a loving-kindness 
ever ready to corne to our aid, and a power ever capa- 
ble of relieving us ; a master and a deliverer, healing 
the ills of the body, to show that He can heal those of 
the soul, even our most secret and deepest afflictions ; 
a holiness withont spot, the holiness of God Himself 
brought down to earth; we find, in a word, in the 



154 



JESUS CHRIST. 



body and spirit of a man, a divine perfection of truth, 
of power, of kindness, and of deliverance, which no 
man bas ever possessed or can conceive of ; and this 
draws us to Him with instinctive conviction that He, 
and He alone, can give us the relief of which we stand 
in need. But as we listen to Scripture, and to Himself, 
the mystery begins to explain itself ; only, however, 
by another mystery still more profound. We learn 
that our Lord Jésus Christ — for such is the man we 
have been contemplating — born of supernatural birth, 
is not only the Son of man, but also, at the same time, 
Son of God : as Son of man, He is man : as Son of 
God, He is God. If His virtues, His power, holiness, 
and loving-kindness are divine, it is that He is God. 
He is the reflection of the person of God, and of the 
splendor of His majesty, " for in Him dwelleth ail the 
fulness of the Godhead bodily." This is the mystery 
of Godliness, God manifested in the flesh, God able to 
say to His disciples, as we heard just now, " He that 
hath seen me hath seen the Father." 

This, my dear friends, I am more and more deeply 
convinced, is properly the key of the entire evangelical 
édifice, and the foundation of the whole Gospel ; and 
this is the conviction of ail the faithful, from the be- 
ginning to the end — prophets, as far as it was given 
them to see into the future, patriarchs, apostles, wit- 



JESUS CHRIST. 



155 



nesses, martyrs, the faithful fathers of the Church, 
reformers, servants of the Lord in ail âges. From this 
point of departure diverge ail the infinitely numerous 
paths toward ail acts of faith and obédience to which 
we may be called; so that Christian life rests so entire- 
ly upon this foundation, Jésus Christ, God manifest in 
the flesh, that, outside and beyond this, not only is 
Jésus Christ dethroned, but God also Himself. The 
living God lives no more : we hear of a god of the 
deists, a god of the pantheists, a god of the ration- 
alists ; but this is not a living, it is only a dead God, 
who has never saved any one, nor sanctified, nor con- 
soled any one, because the true God is He who reveals 
Himself to us, and that not only, but who gives Him- 
self to us in Jésus Christ ; as some one has well said, 
in the création God shows us His hand, but in the 
rédemption He gives us His heart. 

Jésus Christ God, and at the same time man, truly 
and really man, and truly and fully God, seems to 
many a doctrine of spéculation rather than of prac- 
tice (my God, strengthen my feeble voice and my sink- 
ing soul !) ; but it is not so. Yery far from being a 
doctrine of spéculation, it is the very foundation of 
Christian practice and Christian life. St. Paul, while 
he calls it a mystery, calls it " the mystery of Godli- 
ness ; " " great is the mystery of Godliness." Apart 



156 



JESUS CHKIST. 



from or outside of it, there is no Christian life, no 
Christian holiness, Christian consolation, or Christian 
strength, and can be no Christian death. It is the 
foundation of ail the rest ; and the grâce of the Lord 
Jésus shed abroad in our bearts, is our only strength as 
well as our only hope. 

This is why I désire it to be known, and déclare, 
that in Jésus Christ I behold my God, before whom, 
with St. Thomas, I prostrate myself, and say, " My 
Lord and my God ! " I testify of ïïim with St. John, 
" This is the true God and eternal life ; " and with St. 
Paul, that He " is over ail, God blessed forever." I 
honor Him as I bon or the Father ; knowing that the 
Father, so jealous of His glory, far from being jealous 
of the glory which I render to Jésus, approves of it, as 
if it were rendered to Himself; for He desires "that 
ail men should honor the Son, even as they honor the 
Father." I strive to live in communion with Jésus 
Christ, and in the peace of Jésus Christ, praying to 
Him, trusting Him, speaking to Him, listening to Him, 
and offering Him, in short, a constant séries of testi- 
monies, by day and by night, which would be idolatry 
if He were not God, and if He were not God in the 
highest and most unique sensé that the human spirit is 
capable of giving to this sublime name. J esus Christ 
is He who is : " I am " — " I am the way, the truth, and 



JESUS CHRIST. 



157 



the lîfe "— " I am that I am "— " Jehovah "— " tlie Lord 
God Almighty." Jésus Christ is ail this ; and He is ail 
tliis to me. If, in the last moments of iny life, I may 
be prevented by sickness from rendering Him this my 
testimony, I wish it understood that I render it to 
Him now and here; and, in rendering it, I have no 
thought of withdrawing it forever ; for I never expe- 
rienced the little faith and consolation, nor the little 
holiness and charity which I may possess (ail of which 
I pray God to increase), until, changing my earlier 
sentiments, I learned to adore Jésus Christ as my Sav- 
iour and my God. 

Assured of this, I find Jésus Christ at the same 
time my brother, like unto myself — my friend, him who 
is with me, near me, and, as beautifully expressed in 
the eighty-fourth Psalm, " my sun and my shield." 
My sun is m y protection from afar; my shield is my 
protection at my side. Between this divine Sun and 
myself there is so much, a distance so immense (in a 
material point of view I leave to others to calculate it, 
though none can measure the spiritual distance), that 
I have need of the Lord close to me, like a shield pro- 
tecting me ail around ; whose heart may press my 
heart ; whose arms are constantly about me, so that I 
may say to Him, and if I wish, in His ear, so that 
none other may hear me : " I am Thine and Thou art 



158 



JESUS CHEIST. 



mine. I know Thee who Thou art, my God and m y 
brother ; and Thon knowest who I am, Thy child and 
Thy servant, who, in spite of ail his infirmities, believes 
in Thee, and only monrns that he believes so feebly, 
but who aspires to a degree of faith which will enable 
him to glorify Thee in his bitterest trials." — Jésus 
Christ, then, is my brother. Ah, what a privilège to 
h ave God for a brother, and to have a brother in God ! 
I shall never be able even to attempt to say ail I feel 
of the deep, tender mystery of this union of God with 
man. — This is what Jésus Christ is to me. 

I am not able to say more now, but you see what 
my thoughts are upon the subject of our Lord ; and I 
shall be ready to confess them before His tribunal, 
whenever He may call me there, knowing that He will 
not deny me, although thèse feelings are as defective 
and imperfect as my adoration and my gratitude, 
which are infinitely below the measure which I owe 
Him. 

This, my friends, is what Jésus Christ has become 
to me. This is what God in His grâce has made Him 
to me, using turn by turn various methods of éduca- 
tion, various examples, acts, books, and preaching. He 
has used thèse différent instruments in differing man- 
ners and with varying degrees of light, and established 
me thus in His grâce for ail eternity. I have known 



JESUS CHRIST. 



159 



that He has been preparing me, and that He wished to 
give me the power of bearing what He is sending me 
to-day. And what He is sending me today will be 
the end and crowning (if indeed it should so prove, for 
we cannot yet affirm it) of ail His dispensations to me. 

I pray you to examine yourselves well, and see if 
Jésus Christ is for you what He is for the universal 
Church of the faithful ; what He is, I repeat, for the 
patriarchs and prophets, the apostles and martyrs, 
for the fathers and reformers of the Church, and for 
ail saints of ail times. If He be for you what He is 
according to His own Word, what He has declared 
Himself to be, what he is according to the testimony 
of the Father, then you may rest, but until then, 
never ; for none should rest before he has learned to 
do so at the foot of the cross of His Saviour God, 
though he be driven thither by storms and by winds, 
and though he sink weary and fainting at the spot, 
which henceforth he will never more désire to leave ! 



XX. 



THE SCRIPTURES. 

(Febraary 24, 1856.) 

My dear friends in Christ, who show me so marked 
a proof of your affection, those of you who have been 
présent at some of our meetings know that it is my 
especial pleasnre, in the few words which I address to 
yon, to review and reflect npon the recollections of a 
Christian who thinks himself about to appear before 
God, and then, in His présence, to sum up and impart 
to you the main resnlts of his stndy of God's "Word, 
and his conviction of the manner in which he would 
désire to pass his remaining life and meet his end. 
Having, from this point of view, given you the conclu- 
sions which I have reached concerning sin, and the 
person of our Lord Jésus Christ, I propose to occupy 
you a few moments to-day upon the subject of His 
Word. 



THE SCMPTURES. 



161 



I déclare to you, as if before tlie tribunal of Jésus 
Christ, at wbicb I am looking forward soon to appear, 
that ail m y researcbes and study, whether of Scripture, 
of Church history, or of rny own beart — tbat ail tbe 
discussions wbicb in latter years bave been raised upon 
tbe inspiration and divine autbority of the Word of 
God, during tbe whole duration of my ministry (tbree 
periods of about ten years each, at Lyons, Montauban, 
and Paris), bave only confirmed me, tbougb by ways 
and means wbicb tbe wisdom of God bas made ratber 
various, in my unalterable conviction tbat, when 
Scripture speaks, God speaks ; wben it proclaims His 
will, tbe way of salvation, tbe grand doctrines of sin 
and pardon, of tbe Fatber, the Son, and the Holy 
Ghost, what it tells us is not less assuredly and abso- 
lutely true, tban if at this moment the heavens were 
to open over our heads, and the voice of God should 
thunder as of old on Sinai, telling us the same tbings. 
There are no bounds to tbe confidence and submission 
tbat we owe to Scripture, any more tban there are 
limits to the trutb and faithfulness of God. I am so 
sure of this, tbat when the day, known only to God, 
shall corne, tbe day to wbich I look torward as to a 
release (without, bowever, daring to wish to hasten it) 
— when that day cornes, and I enter into the invisible 
world, I do not expect to fincl things there différent 



162 



THE SCRIPTURES. 



from wliat the Word of God has represented tliem to 
me hère — excepting, of course, the immense différence 
between the state of the sonl before and after death, in 
time or in eternity ; but, in the main, the voice which 
I shall then hear, clothed with full powers of judg- 
ment, which will rule snpreme over ail créatures, will 
be the same voice which I hear to-day upon earth, and 
I shall say : " This is indeed what God has already told 
me, and how thankful I am to Him to-day that I have 
not waited to see before I believed ! " The fact is, that 
Scripture is the divine expression of the truths and 
maxims which form the very foun dation of things in- 
visible and eternal ; it is as if God had written a letter 
from the invisible world to His children confined here 
in the visible world, in order that, upon the testimony 
of God Himself, they may learn, in this life, how 
things are beyond, and act accordingly, for the salva- 
tion of their soûls. Those will save their soûls who 
believe God ; but how can those save their soûls who 
do not believe Him % 

Scripture, then, is the Word of God, in the highest 
and at the same time the simplest and most popular 
sensé of the word. It is the one only certain rule of 
faith and of life ; a rule to which ail others must yield. 
Meetings, conférences, prayers, ordinary study and re- 
search, nothing of the sort has any kind of value, except- 



THE SCRIPTUKES. 



163 



ing in so far as it is in accordance with and subordinated 
to the sovereign, infallible, immutable authority of the 
Word of God. The testimony wliich I bere render to 
it is tbat of Moses, David, St. Paul, St. John, Augus- 
tine, Chrjsostom, and of ail saints of ail time ; nor 
only so, but it is the testimony of God Himself and of 
Jésus Christ, who ascribes the same glory to the "Word 
of God as He receives from it. 

Expérience and observation, too, which we are per- 
mitted to summon to our aid, provided we do so in 
humble distrust of ourselves, mercifully confirm ail 
thèse testimonies ; for to no man has it been given, 
nor to any assemblage of men, to produce a book, how- 
ever short, in any way equal to Holy Writ, or capable 
of consolation, sanctification, or conversion, in a similar 
degree; and it never will be given to any man, or as- 
semblage of men, unless under the leading of the Holy 
Spirit, in the same especial manner that the apostles 
and prophets were led. It is not a question of personal 
holiness, for we recognize no less Scripture holiness in 
the words of .St. Paul than in those of Jésus Christ 
Himself: it is a question of divine direction. This 
becomes more clearly apparent when we reflect that 
the Book was written in strict historié order, and that 
nevertheless, although covering a period of nearly two 
thousand years, its doctrine, on ail points, is consistent 



164 



THE SCRIPT URES. 



and uniform. The Bible is an exceptional book, which 
no writer has ever equalled, nor ever will equal. It 
reigns alone suprême over ail Systems, ail doubts, and 
ail questions, which oecupy or agitate the human mind. 

To enter now upon a new train of thought : for rny 
own part, without the closest examination of the Bible, 
I have been scarcely able to sanction its title, the 
Word of God ; the name given to it by God Himself 
and by Jésus Christ ; for I find it full of man, com- 
prising so many marks of humanity ; and, at first, I 
might have felt a sort of fear, as if I had committed 
myself too far in the testimonies which I rendered to 
it. In fact, I observe an individuality of style and 
character, so marked in the différent writers of the 
book, that if, by any impossible chance, a new discov- 
ery were made of a lost book, which had hitherto not 
formed a part of the canonical collection, there would 
be no man at ail versed in Holy Scriptnre, who could 
not say instantly whether it were the work of Jeremiah 
or Isaiah, of St. Peter, St. John, or St. Paul, so great 
are the différences between ail thèse authors, and so 
exactly has each invested ail that he has written with 
his own particular and individual character. I find 
also much that the various writers would have been 
able to say without any especial aid of the Spirit of 
God (2 Tim. iv. 13, etc.) ; and, as God never perforais 



THE SCRIPTUKES. 



165 



useless miracles, we see hère tlie spirit of man taking 
part in the compilation of the Word of God. Still 
further : I find traces of human infirmity, as, for in- 
stance, where St. Paul tries to recollect, and does not 
dare to trust his own memory as to the number of per- 
sons he baptized at Corinth ; it does not, however, give 
him any concern, u for Christ sent me not to baptize, 
but to preach the Gospel " (1 Cor. i. 14-17, etc.). It 
seems to have been clearly God's intention that, on 
every page of the book which we call His "Word, we 
should at the same time recognize the word of man. 

Now, if one who has not reflected on the subject 
might expérience a sort of fear at this, he will soon be 
reassured, and see, on the contrary, a pledge of bless- 
ing and light and spirituality in the human élément 
which enters into the composition of Scripture. For 
how, in fact, could it be avoided % Only, of course, if 
it had been dictated word for word, without any in- 
fluence of personal character or historié events. Let 
us take an extrême example and cite it with profound 
respect. When God puts into the mouth of a stupid 
animal words of rebuke against an unfaithful prophet, 
it is very évident that His Word acts without the agen- 
cy of any médium gifted with will, and the inspiration 
(for inspiration it certainly is) is ail the more notice- 
able in this instance, in that its instrument is entirely 



166 



THE SCRIPTUKES. 



passive. How can such an inspiration as this, the in- 
spiration of a being without reason, be compared to the 
inspiration of an apostle, thoroughly imbned with his 
own expérience and influenced by his personal feel- 
ings ? Applying the same remark to ail the several 
classes of média or instruments of inspiration, we learn 
that in proportion to the activity or passivity of its in- 
strument, inspiration gains in interest as it becomes 
more personal, while at the same time it loses none of 
its authority. 

How mnch more beautiful, then, is Holy Scripture, 
how much more tonching, just as it has been given to 
us ! — given us by God, in the order of history, through 
the médium of men whose spirits were led by the Spirit 
of God ; men like ourselves, who could say, " I be- 
lieved, therefore have I spoken ; " men who could say, 
for example : " Elias was a man snbject to like pas- 
sions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might 
not rain : and it rained not on the earth by the space 
of three years and six months." 

The word of God, being given in history to men 
snch as we are, and not brought down to us by supe- 
rior, invisible beings, but by feeble créatures like our- 
selves, saved by the same means as we are, who were 
the first to believe, and could say, " I believe ail that I 
ask y ou to believe " — h as., for this reason, a life and fresh- 



THE SCRIPTURES 



167 



ness, and a power of touching our hearts far more 
deeply ; it establishes between our hearts and itself a 
sort of familiarity, and, as it were, a secret friendship. 
On this account, the most solemn of ail books is also 
the most tender and the most dear to us. Herein is a 
profound knowledge of the hum an heart, and one of 
the deepest and most subtle beauties of the Word of 
God. 

Composed, then, by simple men, who, though its 
authors, were themselves not free from the necessity of 
battling with sin, nor of personal dependence upon 
the faith they were declaring, the Bible is not only 
none the less on this account the Word of God, but is 
ail the more divine in proportion as it is more human ; 
that is to say, we feel the power and présence of the 
Spirit of God, and His influence upon our soûls, ail the 
more from the fact that He has employed instruments 
to write it, to whom His Spirit al one could impart the 
supernatural power and light necessary to make them 
vessels destined to carry the truth to the ends of the 
earth. It is in this view that Holy Scripture péné- 
trâtes into the deepest recesses of our hearts ; and, 
while teaching us directly from God, it is instructing 
us at the same time bymen, combining at once ail con- 
ditions most capable of touching and enlightening us, 
of converting us to God, of withdrawing us from the 



168 



THE SCRIPTURES. 



darkness of our âge, and of accomplishing in us ail good 
things. There is a contrast or rather a conrparison, 
my dear friends — and tins is my last thought on the 
subject — which, for the Christian, will serve fully to 
elucidate and confirm ail I have said : namely, the aspect 
of Jésus Christ we spoke of last Sunday, which is given 
us every where in Scripture ; His uniting in Himself 
the divine and human natures in a manner so marvel- 
lous that we cannot comprehend it, but which is never- 
theless the foundation of our faith and its consolation. 
Last Sunday we began by considering Jésus Christ in 
His human perfection, after which we conteinplated 
Him in His divinity. Suppose we had reversed this 
order, and had first spoken of the divine nature of our 
Lord, and of our obligation to adore Him as God, and 
that then, for the first time, we made the reflection that 
Jésus Christ is a man, capable of suffering and death — 
I know not what fear might have corne over our soûls, 
as if we had attributed to Him too much of the divine. 
But Scripture shows us everywhere, as we said last 
Sunday, that in Him perfect divinity is joined with 
perfect humanity, that each exalts the other, without in 
any way compromising its reality. It is revealed to us 
that He is ail the more man in that He is the more 
God, and ail the more God that He is the more man. 
For, at what moments of His life is Jésus most of ail 



THE SCRIPTURES. 



169 



man ? Is it not in the temptation in the désert, in the 
anguish of Gethsemane, and the fearful agony of the 
cross % And are not thèse precisely the moments when 
He is most of ail God, as victor over the tempter, snr- 
monnting the pain and trinmphing over the cross, by 
the power of the Spirit of God, which dwells in ïïim, 
not as in us, in a measnre, but without measure, as in 
the only Son of the Father ? 

The same can be said of the Word of God : it is 
the Word of God, His véritable, eternal Word, and at 
the same time it is the word of man, in which we feel 
the réfection of man's spirit, and hear the beating of 
man's heart. And we can further say that it is ail the 
more divine when the most hum an, because precisely 
in the moments when in St. Paul or St. John, for ex- 
ample, we notice the combat of faith and the persever- 
ing strnggle against sin, we feel ail the more strong- 
ly how divine is the light shed forth in their soûls, 
enabling them fîrst to strive in their own behalf, and 
then, with divine courage, to spread abroad the light 
through the entire world. 

How wonderful and admirable seems to me this 

point of resemblance between Jésus Christ and Holy 

Scripture ! And you may well believe that I have not 

ventured to draw it from my own fancy, but it is fur- 

nished me by the Word of God itself. For him who 
8 



170 



THE SCRIPTURES. 



knows that Scripture ne ver speaks in vain, it is enough 
to remember a very remarkable fact. The same name 
is applied to Jésus Christ and to Holy Scripture. 
They are both called the Word of God. The One, 
J esus Christ, is the living Word of God, the personal 
manifestation of His invisible perfections to the human 
race ; while the other, Holy Scripture, is the written 
Word of God, the verbal manifestation of the same in- 
visible perfections, clothed in language. The two are 
inséparable for us : for Jésus Christ is not otherwise 
revealed to us than by Scripture, nor is Scripture given 
us except to reveal Jésus Christ. Scripture, then, is the 
written Word of God, as Jésus Christ is the living 
Word of God. Those who take their stand upon the 
human characteristics of Scripture to question its 
divinity, reason precisely as those do who appeal to 
the personal humanity of Jésus, to deny Him the title 
of God ; not understanding that the human and the 
divine natures are united in the person of our Lord, in 
the same way as the divine is united with the human 
word in Holy Scripture. It is no more astonishing 
that Scripture, although the Word of God, should ex- 
hibit so many traces of humanity, than that Jésus 
Christ, although God, should be also man. As to the 
manner in which, in the one case, the two natures 
blend, and in the other, the two voices — the voice of 



THE SCRIPTURES. 



171 



God, and the voice of man — that is the very founda- 
tion and object of our faith, a profound mystery, but 
as St. Paul tells us, " the mystery of godliness " which 
fills our soûls with joy and h ope. 

Yes, Scripture is the one road by which we can 
attain to the knowledge of Jésus Christ, without dan- 
ger of error, even as Jésus Christ is the one way, 
through which we can attain unto the Father. Yes, if 
you désire to save your soûls, you must believe in the 
"Word of God ; must submit yourselves to the Word of 
God. Look for nothing within yourselves, by what- 
ever fine name you may choose to call it, whether rea- 
son, intelligence, feeling, or conscience, to rise superior 
to, to judge, or to control the Word of God. It can- 
not be controlled, but must control. The greatest of 
ail the servants of God are those who humbled them- 
selves the most deeply before His Word, like David, 
St. Paul, Luther, or Calvin, who desired with jealousy 
to abase themselves before it to the very dust, and still 
lower, if they could. 

May it, then, reign without rival, this Word of my 
Saviour God ! I am so happy to render to it once 
again this my testimony, " before I go hence and am 
no more seen " — may it reign until the banner of eternal 
life, which here below we can only half unfurl, waves 
over us in the pure and serene light of heaven above ! 



XXI. 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

(March. 2, 1856.) 

"What a blessing and favor, dearly beloved, if we 
could only appreciate it, to receive this bread and 
wine wbicb the Lord gives us ; présent Himself with 
us, though absent, and ail the more présent, being ab- 
sent, than if He were actually here with us : " This is 
My body which is broken for you ; this is My blood 
which is shed for you." We are called upon hence- 
forth to do nis work, by our intimate union with Him, 
by our possession of His body and blood. In His 
broken body and shed blood, we are called upon to 
endure ail the suiFerings and anguish of the flesh ; 
renewed by the Holy Spirit in Him who calls us to 
His eternal communion, by means of the visible and 
présent communion, we have for the work of Jésus, the 
strength of Jésus, the grâce of Jésus, and the divine 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 173 



nature of which we hâve been made partakers in Jésus 
by the promises of faith. 

Alas ! we are but of little faith. What a spectacle 
should we give to the world, if we were men of great 
faith, of a faith like that of the centurion, which ex- 
cited the admiration and astonishment of the Lord 
Himself — a faith which, seizing hold upon Jésus Christ, 
would, in Him, seize upon eternal life, and ail the 
treasures of grâce which abound in this merciful Sav- 
iour ! 

We were occupied, a few days since, my dear 
friends, in consideriug the Christian's thoughts as he 
reaches his last moments ; when, near the end of his 
earthly career, he says modestly and humbly to his 
Lord, " I have finished the work which Thou gavest 
me to do " (if, indeed, he has been faithful in his humble 
sphère) — we were considering, I say, the power and 
the truth of that word by which our Lord is revealed 
to us, with which, day by day, He nourishes our soûls, 
so that it is to us, as it were, a perpétuai communion, 
by means of which we live in the life of Jésus Christ, 
and accomplish His work. 

We must not forget, however, but learn well, 
whether from the déclarations of the Word of God, or 
from the humiliating expériences of our own life, that 
this word, all-powerful and divine as it is (of which 



174 THE HOLY SPIRIT. 



Job said, " Oh, how forcible are right words ! "), bas 
no power excepting in so far as it is applied to our 
soûls by that Spirit which has caused it to be written 
on the pages of the Book ; which bas worked upon tbe 
beart of sucb as Isaiab and Jeremiah, St. Paul and St. 
John, and, having chosen them for organs, has led them 
to impart eternal truth, without danger of error, to ail 
générations of men. The Word must be rewritten in 
our hearts and remain firmlj fixed there, by the same 
Spirit, else it is for us a dead word and of none effect. 
We might read the Holy Scriptures again and again 
for years, without gaining any real blessing from them, 
and be astonished to find them of so little power and 
so little justified by our expérience, if the Holy Spirit 
did not explain them and apply them to us, by coming 
Himself to dwell in us. 

Well, this same Spirit which applies and explains to 
us the Word of God is He who worketh in us ail 
things. The work of the Father, who has saved us 
without money and without priée, and the work of the 
Son, who has purchased us with His precious blood, is 
ail in vain, without the work of the Holy Spirit, who 
opens our soûls to believe in the Father and in the 
Son, and to put in practice the words of life. The 
Scripture represents to us man, the heart of man, 
where ail is great, infinité, and eternal, as a spectacle 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 



175 



exciting the attention of tlie holy angels, and of the 
Lord Himself, in which a continuai battle is being 
fought between the powers of hell and the powers of 
heaven ; a renewal of tbe great combat between the 
same two powers, in the inner and outer life of our 
Lord Jésus Christ, in which He was completely victor, 
and made us thereby, in our turn, more than con- 
querors in Him who hath loved us. 

We are thus either the dwelling-places and the 
slaves of the spirit of darkness, or the happy, most 
happy slaves and abiding-places of the Spirit of light 
and of life ; and it is for us • to choose, either the one 
by unbelief, or the other by faith, for it is written : " I 
have set before thee life and good, and death and evil ; 
therefore choose." Bat there is this différence, which 
is well worthy of the loving mercy of God : the spirit 
of Satan, ingenious as he may be in trying and forcing 
ail the entrances and gate-ways to our hearts, is never- 
theless not able to unité himself entirely to our spirit 
and become one with it, while, on the other hand, the 
Spirit of God deigns to penetrate us, and to join Him- 
self so entirely to us, that we become temples of the 
Holy Ghost ; and, filled thus with the Spirit of Jésus 
Christ, we are rendered able to do the works which He 
did, and even in one sensé, still greater : as He said 
Himself, in announcing the promise of the Comforter : 



176 



THE HOLY SPIRIT 



u He that believsth on Me, the works that I do, shall 
lie do also ; and greater works than thèse shall he do ; " 
so much so, that Jésus déclares to His disciples, that 
for the sake of the Holy Spirit which He would send 
them, it were better for them if He left them : " It is 
expédient for you that I go away." 

O my Saviour, how often have I longed to have 
Thee near to me, as Thou wert to Peter and John, to 
be able to approach Thee, to converse with Thee, and 
consult Thee ! But Thou declarest to me Thyself, 
that there is a gift so precious that, to possess it, it 
were better for me that Thou shouldst départ. And 
this gift hast Thou given to me, by the Holy Spirit ! 

Who are they who know and value the gift of the 
Holy Spirit ? Ail that we can say is, that God grants 
to His Ohurch of to-day the grâce to feel how little it 
has appreciated and possessed this Creator-Spirit. He 
is none other than God Himself, coming to dwell in us, 
and to make ail things new in us, the Holy Spirit, to 
whom nothing is impossible. Happy he who believes 
and doubts not ! If I have a terrible temptation to 
overcome, it is not I who am to conquer it, but the 
Spirit of God, whom I cali down into my heart by 
prayer. If I have to bear pain, intolérable to my 
body, it is not I who bear it, but the Spirit of God 
whom I summon to my heart by prayer. If I am to 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 



m 



clothe myself with tlie spirit of love, so contrary to our 
natural selfishness, it is not I who will be able to exer- 
cise the power and force of love, but it is the Spirit of 
God witliin me, invoked by prayer — and in ail else the 
same. To doubt that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we 
are able to accomplish the work to which we are called, 
we must begin by doubting, first, that God is faithful 
to His promises, and then that He has the necessary 
power to fulfil them. u O my friends," said once a 
dying Christian, " even at our very best days we have 
our eyes only half open." I apply thèse words most 
particularly to the virtue and power of the Holy 
Spirit ; for, if we had our eyes fully open, to see Him 
and appreciate Him, would there be ail the complaints 
and groaning that are in our midst % and should we 
not ever be seen filled with the power of the commun- 
ion of Christ to accomplish our work % 

My friends, look at the place which the Holy Spirit 
occupies in Scripture, in the promises of Christ to His 
apostles. Observe the transition, worked by the Spirit, 
from the Gospels to the Acts; the immense change 
brought about in the apostles themselves, to show to 
ail disciples, of ail générations, what It is capable of 
doing in ail time. The Holy Spirit is the great prom- 
ise of the New Testament, and puts the crowning seal 
upon ail the rest. 



178 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 



Elected of the Father, ransomed by the Son, if we 
are filled with the Holy Spirit, and live in His life, 
then and then only are we pnt in possession of our 
héritage here, while waiting for it in its fulness in a 
better world, nnder a sky more serene, freed from ail 
infirmities of flesh and earth ; when we shall be noth- 
ing other than temples of the Holy Spirit, when even 
our bodies have become glorions and spiritual bodies. 

Sink, then, soon into earth, thou vile body of dust 
and of sin, and give place to the glorious body — to the 
spiritual body, in which we shall do the will of God, 
with the perfection even of Christ Himself ; and, by 
the light of the Holy Spirit, shall know ail the gifts 
and ail the grâces of the same Spirit, and know them 
to enjoy them ; and, above ail, enjoy our power to love 
as we are loved ! 



XXII. 



ALL IN JESUS CHRIST. 

(Mardi 9, 1856.) 

1 Corinthians il. 1-10 : " And I, brethren, when I came to you, came 
not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testi- 
mony of God. For I determined not to know any thing among you, save 
Jésus Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and 
in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was 
not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in démonstration of the 
Spirit and of power : That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of 
men, but in the power of God. Howbeit we speak wisdom among them 
that are perfect : Yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of 
this world, that corne to nought : But we speak the wisdom of God in a 
mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world 
unto our glory : which none of the princes of this world knew : for had 
they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as 
it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into 
the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him. But God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit : for the Spirit 
searcheth ail things, yea, the deep things of God." 

Côllectihg- and summing up with you, my dear 
friends, as if under your own eyes, the results to which 
the expérience of my life and Gospel-ministry and 



180 



ALL IN JESUS CHKIST. 



study of the Word of God have led me, and confirmed 
in me, I said last Sunday, " Ail by the Holy Spirit ; " let 
us say to-day, ail in Jésus Christ. We are sometimes 
tempted to represent Jésus Christ to ourselves as hav- 
ing only opened to us the gâtes of heaven, and then in 
some sort as having left us to find our way thither our- 
selves ; but this is a very narrow view to take of what 
our Lord has done for us, and what He is for us. St. 
Paul's thoughts certainly soared far higher than this, 
when he wrote : " I determined not to know any thing 
among you, save Jésus Christ and Him crucified." 
For him, ail of God is comprised in Jésus Christ, and 
ail of Jésus Christ in His cross. And elsewhere, " Of 
Him are ye in Christ Jésus, who of God is made unto 
us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and 
rédemption ; " whence we see that Jésus Christ was 
not only given to us to wash away our sins, in His 
blood once shed for us, but that He is given to us 
again, after we have been reconciled with God by His 
precious blood, to lead us, to sanctify us, to fill us with 
wisdom, and to accomplish ail things in us. Again, 
" For in Him dwelleth ail the fulness of the Godhead 
bodily." God dwells. in Christ, in the flesh, under a 
visible form, and dwells there in His whole fulness, 
with ail His glory and ail His eternal perfections. 
Still again, another very profound passage from the 



ALL IN JESUS CHRIST. 181 

same apostle : " Ail (things) are y ours, and ye are 
Christ's, and Christ is God's." Here we see God, in 
admirable and marvellons hierarchy, at the head of the 
entire organization of eternal truth, sending and lead- 
ing His Son, and His Son, in His turn, calling ns and 
adopting us to Himself, in order that, in the name of 
the Son, we may have dominion over ail things, may 
possess the whole universe in right of membership with 
Him to whom the whole universe is subject. " Ail 
things are y ours," the first step ; the second, " Ye are 
Christ's ; " and " Christ is God's," the third step, or the 
first, the suprême fact, to which ail the rest attaches 
itself, and upon which ail the rest dépends. 

How far we are now from the thought of those who 
represent Christ to themselves as having only accom- 
plished one act, his principal act, our salvation ! Jésus 
Christ is the God of man, as Pascal has so well said in 
a few pages devoted to showing, in a truly Christian 
manner, the place occupied by Christ between Go$ 
and us ; He is the God of man ; He is God who has 
given Himself to us ; He has given Himself to us quite 
entirely ; and when we possess Jésus Christ by true 
faith, we possess nothing less than God Himself, and, 
in Him, life eternal : " He that hath the Son, hath 
life . . . God hath given to us eternal life, and this 
life is in His Son." 



182 ALL m JESUS CHRIST. 

"Whatever, then, niay be our need which craves sat- 
isfying, in oui' soûls or in our entire existence earthly 
and eternal, we find it in Jésus Christ. Do we crave, 
above ail, that our sins be blotted out ? He has washed 
them away with His blood. There is only one thing 
can take away sin ; no pennace of ours, no repentance 
of ours, no amount of almsgiving or of other good 
works; not even our prayers — the blood of Christ 
alone. " The blood of Jésus Christ, His Son, cleanseth 
from ail sin." Every sin, covered by the blood of 
Christ, is forever annihilated before God. He Him- 
self can no longer see it. I could use still stronger 
language, without departing from Scripture. " The 
iniquity of Israël," says a prophet, " shall be sought 
for and there shall be none ; and the sins of Judah, 
and they shall not be found. . . . He has cast our sins 
behind His back," that He may no more see them. 
" He has cast them into the depths of the sea; " and, 
looking at us in Christ, He looks upon us as without 
sin, even as Christ Himself, who was " made to be sin 
for us, that we might be made the righteousness of 
God in Him." 

Do we long for comfort in our sufferings ? "We go 
to Christ ; He has suffered like ourselves, more than 
ourselves, infinitely more than we are able to suffer, 
infinitely more than we can conceive of the possibility 



ALL IN JESUS CHRIST. 



183 



of suffering ; ail our sorrows are but a little rivulet 
detached from the mighty river of His infinité sorrow, 
and from His cross alone ail consolation and ail pity 
and mercy flow. To the Man of sorrows we must go 
for consolation and peace, knowing that He under- 
stands our languor and feebleness, and, in going to 
Him, we shall find not only relief from our sufferings, 
but shall see in them real blessings ; our most bitter 
afflictions will in the end be found the most signal 
marks of His grâce. 

Do we seek understanding and wisdom, strength 
and power to resist sin ? Whatever we need, in this 
world or in the other, we find ail in Christ. If we 
have Christ, we have ail things, and without Him we 
have absolutely nothing. Hence the Apostle St. Paul, 
in the wonderful passage I have just quoted, says : 
" Ail (things) are yours, and ye are Christ's, and Christ 
is God's." Ail things are yours if you are Christ's, 
who is God's. No man will contest the relation of 
God to Christ ; nor, if we are real Christians, can 
Christ's relation to us be contested. Well, then, what 
follows ? Why, that ail things are ours. Am I poor ? 
Ail the fortunes of the world belong to me ; for they 
are Christ's and He is God's, and God will give me, 
with Him and besides Him, ail the wealth of the earth, 
if it be for my good. If, instead of riches, He gives 



184 



ALL IN JESUS CHRIST. 



me poverty, it is because poverty is best for me, and 
therefore His choice for me. The whole world and ail 
its glories and powers belong to me, for they belong to 
my Father, and He will give them to me to-morrow, 
or even to-day, if they are for my greatest good ; for 
Ile disposes of them according to His will and pleas- 
ure. Am I sick ? Health is mine, strength is mine, 
comfort is mine, a perfect enjoyment of ail the bless- 
ings of life is mine. For ail this is Christ's, and Christ 
is God's, and He will give ail as He sees fit. And to 
whom will He give them, if not to me, His child ? If 
He then withholds them from me to-day, for a short, 
fleeting moment, which passes like the weaver's shut- 
tle, it is only becanse He has His reasons for doing so ; 
and there are hidden blessings in my bitterness and 
sorrow, worth far more to me than health ever so pre- 
cions, or comfort ever so sweet. He never deprives me 
of any blessing, unless to grant me some other and 
greater : there is my consolation — I find it ail in His 
love. 

Do I désire wisdom and understanding ? Well, 
suppose even that I remain ignorant ail my life ; that, 
in this world, I h ave never had opportunity to culti- 
vate my faculties ; still, in Christ I am learned. With 
the knowledge of Christ, I am more advanced and en- 
lightened by the things of God, than the man of this 



ALL IN JESUS CHEIST. 



185 



world who lias passed his whole life with his books ; 
for I know the uncreated, eternal light which he does 
not know, the light in which G-od Himself delights, 
and by which I am infallibly led through ail the dark- 
ness of life. I defy you to find any thing of which I 
cannot say : " This is my Father's, therefore it is mine ; 
if He refuses it to me to-day, He will give it me to- 
morrow : I trust in His love. Every thing is mine if 
I am Christ's." 

Observe also that St. Paul says in the chapter we 
have read : " For I determined not to know any thing 
among you, save Jésus Christ and Him crucified." 
O my friends, let us not be so ungrateful as to for- 
get that trader the cross, and by the cross alone, Christ 
lias earned and gained for us the immense happiness 
which I try to describe, of which, however, I am able to 
gain no glimpse, nor to form the slightest conception. 
His blood shed, His inconceivable sufferings, have 
accomplished ail for us. His love is the principle of 
our salvation, and of our entire rédemption. His love 
is our Saviour. 

Here we began, and here we will finish. We will 
go to His cross, and seat ourselves under it ; we will 
allow nothing in the world to remove us from the 
place where we désire to live and to die. 

Dear friends, very soon the things of this world 



186 



ALL m JESUS CHRIST. 



will liave passed away. In the world we hâve sorrow, 
but let us be of good cheer, Jésus Christ h as overcome 
the world ; the strong man has been bound by a 
stronger than himself, and we are now in the présence 
of Christ, who has purchased us with His blood, and is 
waiting to crown us with glory and happiness. Do 
you not désire His glory ? Do you not wish for His 
love? Know Him, then, even as He is. Lay hold 
upon Him wholly, by a sincère faith, that you may 
realize the admirable words of the apostle upon which 
we have been meditating ; that you may be happy in 
life, and still happier in death ; that life, sad as it is for 
the man of the world, may be for you an existence of 
constantly-increasing light and peace, until the day of 
Christ, to whom be rendered ail praise, honor, and 
glory, and, above ail, the homage of our hearts and of 
our love, responsive, were it possible, to His own ! 



XXIII. 



THE TRINITY. 

(March 16, 1856.) 

Romans tjii. 12-17 : " Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to 
the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall 
die : but if ye through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye 
shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons 
of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear ; 
but ye have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father. 
The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children 
of God : and if children, then heirs ; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with 
Christ ; if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified 
together." 

Holy Scripture is wise, even in its silence. You 
will search the Bible in vain for the word Trmity, as 
an expression of the doctrine upon which, if God give 
me strength, I have it at heart to say a few words to 
you. Why is this ? Becanse the word Trinity would 
présent to our minds the idea of something spéculative, 
whereas the doctrine which human theology in later 
days has appropriately called by this name is, of ail 



188 



THE TRINITY. 



doctrines, the most practical and the most tender, be- 
cause the very expression of God's love, whether in 
His relations with humanity, or in the inner relations 
of God to Himself. The principle of onr salvation lies 
in the love of God. " We love Him, becanse He first 
loved us ; " " God is love," and this love is manifested 
to us in the work of our salvation ; but it has been 
revealed to us, not only in saving us, but as existing 
from ail eternity in the heart of God, and causing His 
eternal happiness, before making ours and that of ail 
His faithful créatures. 

In order to understand the manner in which the 
love of God opérâtes upon His poor, lost créatures, to 
give them the life eternal, which they have lost by 
their own doing, we have only to folio w simply the his- 
torié order in which God has given us His révélations, 
and inspired His prophets and apostles to furnish us 
His Scriptures. Thus we find first, the God of the Old 
Testament ; then the God of the Gospels ; and, lastly, 
the God of the Epistles and Gospel prophecies. 

In the Old Testament, we learn already enough to 
fill our hearts with joy (O my God ! show forth Thy 
strength in my infirmity !) — we find there quite 
enough to fill our hearts with joy, namely, that, ail 
unworthy of His love as we have rendered ourselves, 
God has nevertheless loved us. We have deserved, 



THE TRINITY. 



189 



thousands and thousands of times, that He should 
déclare Hiinself against us : and if any one is not thor- 
oughly penetrated with this thought, he has only to 
turn to the pages of the prophets (in particular Eze- 
kiel), which are filled Ml of the terrible doctrine of 
the jndgments of God which the Israélites, by their 
evil deeds, had drawn down npon themselves. They 
deserved them, however, no more than the rest of man- 
kind, for their history is only the mirror of that of ail 
mankind. But observe that, instead of declaring Him- 
self against us, God déclares Himself for us ; and we 
learn that, precisely when we ought to expect to meet 
a torrent of anger, we find a treasure of mercy. The 
all-powerful God, who lias created heaven and earth, 
the author of ail things, visible and invisible, is en- 
tirely for us / He only asks to save us ; and whoever 
is willing to enter into His views and thoughts, to con- 
fess his sins and submit Himself to His pardon and 
grâce, will possess eternal life, just as if he had never 
sinned ; or, rather, having sinned, but now reconciled, 
he will possess it with a new sentiment of the mercy 
that is in God. In this wise, God reveals Himself to 
us in the Old Testament, divine love penetrating 
everywhere, and removing the heavy burden of divine 
anger. The prophets, who denounce thèse terrible 
judgments, are not long able to maintain such lan- 



190 



THE THINITY. 



guage, and always finish with words of mercy. Ton 
will find this illnstrated in a very remarkable manner 
by the prophet Micah, who in very few pages develops 
with admirable fulness the plan of condemnation, of 
prophecy, and of the salvation npon which he finally 
rests. 

Then corne the Gospels predicted by the prophets. 
And now God takes a step further : He draws near to 
ns ; He is not satisfied with declaring, as from a dis- 
tance, that He is for ns, but He cornes to live in close 
union with ns, like one of ourselves, Son of Man, taken 
from among men, albeit Son of God as He is. Having 
been for us, He is now with us, close to us, like a 
brother and a friend, with whom, in the words of the 
fifty-fifth Psalm, we may " take sweet counsel to- 
gether." 

God now shows Himself to us under a much ten- 
derer and more consoling aspect than that under which 
we saw Him in the Old Testament, more especially 
when this brother and friend ends by revealing to us 
the doctrine of divine justice and divine mercy, by 
dying for us upon the cross, and there blotting out oûr 
sins. But while this so tender a relation develops 
itself between God and us, another relation develops 
itself in the heart of God Himself, and we learn that 
He who ransoms us is the Son of Him who wishes to 



THE TRINITY. 



191 



save us ; that between God, as He appears in the Old 
Testament, and the God of the Gospels, there exists 
the touching relationship of Father and Son : we can- 
not understand this relationship in God, but we can at 
least discern in it something at once ineffably tender 
and mysterious. Remark well, that one of thèse rela- 
tions could not exist without the other, and that we 
shall never understand what God is for us, in Jésus 
Christ, if we do not, in part at least, see what Jésus 
Christ is for God — and ail the more that there is, be- 
sides, something else which must not escape us. We 
can only comprehend the spirit of love in its fulness, 
as a spirit of sacrifice : but with God, it would seem, 
sacrifice were impossible ; for what can for a moment 
interrupt His eternal felicity ? But, behold, in the 
person of His Son, the Lord of lords sets us the exam- 
ple of sacrifice ; He who is the Son of the Father, is at 
the same time the " Man of sorrows ; " and in Him, in 
whom " dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead bodily," is 
displayed to our touched and grateful hearts, ail the 
ineffable immensity of suffering of which humanity is 
capable — and capable only through its union with 
divinity. 

And do you not see that this touching doctrine 
would completely disappear, if the Son is not one with 
the Father, and that ail that excites our tender grati- 



192 



THE TRINITY. 



tude for the Lord Jésus Christ dépends upon the fact 
that He is veritably Son of God, that is to say, God, 
as He is the Son of Man, that is to say, Man ? 

J^ext corne the Epistles and the Gospel prophecy ; 
and how do they open ? By the descent of the Holy 
Ghostj who founds the Church, by coming and abiding 
with it. This is the third and last step which God 
takes, to meet His poor fallen créature, and we could 
conceive of none further. He was already with us, 
now observe that He cornes to establish Himself in us, 
and to make Himself so far one with us that of thèse 
wretched bodies, born of the dust, and become slaves 
of sin, He forms temples of His Holy Spirit, the home 
of God, where it pleases Him to dwell. The Holy 
Spirit, in other words, God, now gives Himself to us, 
after having been for us in the Old Testament and 
with us in the Gospels. This is the highest reach of 
divine love ; it cannot content itself, if not made one 
with us, if not corne to dwell in us, " He in us, and 
we in Him." 

And here again remark, my dear friends, that ail 
the force of this doctrine of life would disappear if the 
Holy Spirit, instead of being God Himself, were only 
an émanation from God, or an act or a gift of God. 
It would be then but a répétition of what we know 
abundantly from the Old Testament and the Gospels 



THE TRINITY. 



193 



of the power and tlie grâce that God is able and will- 
ing to communicate to us ; while, on the other hand, 
the Holy Ghost, as He reveals Himself to us in the 
epistles, the end of the ~New Testament, and in the 
promises of Jésus Christ to His disciples, being God 
Himself, is the power of God that strengthens us, is 
the peace of God that comforts us, the holiness of God 
winch delivers us from evil, and the life of God which 
beats in our hearts. 

Oh ! who can measure and understand the im- 
mense progress in advance, from the last chapter of the 
Gospels, to the first chapter of the Acts of the Apos- 
tles? Who can properly appreciate the wonderful 
mardi of révélation and of the divine gifts, in the three 
parts of Holy Scripture which we have been consider- 
ing? We have done so, alas ! far too rapidly for the 
importance of the subject, although too much at length 
for the failing powers of him who speaks ; for I am 
only able to indicate, thus briefly, this most admirable 
view of the subject. 

The relations of the Father, the Son, and the Holy 

Ghost to man, correspond to a relation of the Father, 

Son, and Holy Ghost in God, and the love which is 

lavished for our salvation is the expression of the love 

which from eternity has dwelt in the bosom of God. 

Ah ! the doctrine we are studying, how profound and 
9 



194 



THE TRINITY. 



touchiug it becomes to us ! It is the very pitli of the 
Gospel, and those wlio reject it, as purely spéculative 
and theological, hâve never, in any degree, understood 
it. It is the strength of our heart, the joy of our soul, 
the life of our life, and the very foundation of revealed 
truth. 

But I am. obliged to stop, and to leave for your 
own méditation what I should have desired to add to 
what has been said, and rnust confine myself, in con- 
clusion, to repeating a few words which I have often 
quoted, but which some here may not have heard. 
They sum up, most admirably, the whole doctrine we 
have been discussing. A father of the Church has said : 
u In the Old Testament, we have God for us ; in the 
Gospels, Godwith us ; and in the Epistles, God in us? 

That this God, for you, with you and in you, the 
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, may be yours 
and mine, for life and for death, I désire from the very 
depths of my heart, devoted to you in Christ Jésus ! 



XXIY. 
THE RESURRECTION. 

(Easter Day, March 23, 1856.) 

Ephesians ii. 1-10 : " And you hath He quickened, who were dead 
in trespasses and sins ; wherein in time past ye walked according to the 
course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the 
spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience : among whom 
also we ail had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, 
fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind ; and were by nature 
the children of wrath, even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy, 
for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in 
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grâce ye are saved), and 
hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places 
in Christ Jésus : that in the âges to come He might show the exceeding 
riches of His grâce in His kindness toward us through Christ Jésus. For 
by grâce are ye saved through faith ; and that not of yourselves : it is 
the gift of God : not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are 
His workmanship, created in Christ Jésus unto good works, which God 
hath before ordained that we should walk in them." 

It is written, " Faith is the substance of things 
lioped for, the évidence of things not seen ; " that is to 
say, it possesses the double virtue of rendering future 
things présent, and invisible things visible. Now, sup- 



196 



THE RESURRECTION. 



pose there were a fact in which tins double property 
of faith were realized, and as it were incorporated, a 
fact adding the clearness of reality to the power of 
faith, wonld not tins fact be the very foundation of ail 
our knowledge, and the firmest support of our hopes ? 
This fact is the résurrection of our Lord Jésus Christ. 

Scripture begins by uniting the Christian so closely 
by faith to his Saviour, that any thing happening to 
Him, happens also to us, and His history is essentially 
reproduced in the inner life of each one of His chil- 
dren. If He dies, we die; if He rises again, we rise 
again ; if He ascends to heaven, we also ascend to 
heaven. Thus are we saved, because by faith made 
one with Christ, and Him we are not permitted to seek 
elsewhere than in eternal glory, which obliges us to 
seek ourselves there also, being one with Him by faith. 

But Jésus Christ, after having lived and died under 
the eyes of men, rises again also under their eyes, and 
shows Himself again to men after His résurrection. 
So then, the résurrection of our Saviour, which be- 
longs also to us, like ail the rest, becomes a visible 
event, making our own résurrection visible, from being 
invisible, as it was before. You remember those here- 
tics of whom St. Paul speaks, who said that the résur- 
rection had already taken place, looking upon it as a 
purely spiritual event : they are in flagrant opposition 



THE RESURRECTION. 



197 



to tlie doctrine of the Gospel ; for this makes of our 
Saviour's résurrection, and of our own, which we are 
to enjoy after Him and with Him, a real, material, 
corporeal fact — showing us, in our Lord's résurrection, 
our own, as if already before our eyes. What an im- 
mense blessing and privilège, for the Christian to con- 
template in Jésus Christ, visibly raised from the dead, 
his own résurrection, which would seem invisible, and 
in one sensé is so, but which becomes visible in his 
Saviour ! It is thus raised above, I will not say ail 
doubt, but above even ail the difficulties of faitb, and 
becomes a clear, appréciable fact, easily grasped, that 
we find in Jésus Christ, and apply to ourselves. 

And at the same time — for in my présent condition 
I can do no more than merely touch upon the vari- 
ous thoughts presented by the subject — the résurrec- 
tion of our Lord Jésus Christ converts a future event 
into an event présent, and even already past. If He 
were not raised from the dead, we should always look 
upon the résurrection as upon something to come, and 
presenting, for this reason, the idea of something 
always obscure, and difficult to grasp, albeit the prom- 
ises of God are certain. But God has here joined to 
His promise an historié fact. Jésus Christ did rise from 
the dead. He was seen ; behold Him ! — and our 
résurrection, which is united with that of the Saviour 



198 



THE RESURRECTION. 



and follows froni it, beconies in the same way itself an 
historié fact, a fact présent and a fact past. St. Panl 
says, therefore, that we are already risen again. He 
" hath raised ns up together, and made us sit together 
in heavenly places in Christ Jésus." By the résurrec- 
tion of our Saviour, then, our salvation, from being in- 
visible, beconies visible; from being future, becomes 
présent and actual. What more could we ask ? 

The Christian alone can feel a firm assurance of his 
reconciliation with God and of his eternal happiness, 
because to him invisible things have passed into the 
domain of things visible and présent ; and he can enjoy 
their contemplation in some sort with his eyes, seizing 
them even in this life. You will further remark, dear 
friends, that wh ère ver the résurrection of our Saviour 
is kept in the background, the assurance of our salva- 
tion remains there with it. Thus, in the Chureh of 
Rome, where attention is constantly called to the 
death of our Saviour Jésus Christ, and not to His 
résurrection ; where the essential and principal cere- 
mony of the Chureh, the mass, is the célébration of the 
death of Jésus Christ, there is no assurance of our sal- 
vation ; we should become even scrupulous about being 
sure of our safety, and take as it were a sort of pride in 
our scruples, and wrest certain passages of Scripture to 
make them déclare that it is never permitted us to be 



THE RESURRECTION. 



199 



sure of our safety : which means that there can never be 
peace nor ever firm hope for the Christian. There are, 
unfortunately, inany Protestants who are no further 
advanced, and who cannot rejoice in the assurance of 
their salvation : this is because they do not contem- 
plate Jésus Christ raised from the dead and now living 
and mediating between God and us; nor do they 
regard the relations between God and our soûls as liv- 
ing, présent, historié facts. But the Christian, en- 
lightened upon the subject of the résurrection of our 
Saviour, enjoys the assurance of his salvation. He is 
as certain of it as he is certain that Jésus Christ was 
raised from the dead, and, to make him doubt his eter- 
nal hope, he must be ruade to doubt the résurrection 
of our Saviour. 

This is why the day we are celebrating is the 
grandest day of the Christian year, and the event we 
are calling to mind to-day is not an event in the king- 
dom of heaven, but the event in the kingdom of heav- 
en. The résurrection of our Saviour is the essential 
fact which the apostles devoted themselves to teach. 

Now, my fri ends, let us seize this résurrection, and 
hold fast to it ; let us live with the risen Christ, and 
we shall delight in the precious privilège. But at the 
same time let us not forget the price at which the 
résurrection lias been purchased for us, nor the road to 



200 



THE RESURRE CTION. 



it over which our Saviour passed ; that our hearts may 
taste the happiness of this assurance, only in a deep 
feeling of gratitude and love to Him to whom we owe 
it. 

Receive thèse few words in the love of the Lord, as 
I address them to you — it is ail that I am able to say 
— and let us, one and ail, apply ourselves to ineditating 
upon them, and expanding them in His présence, in 
the silence of prayer and in the study of the "Word of 
God, at the feet of the risen Saviour, and in the love 
of Jésus Christ crucified ! Amen ! 



XXV. 



GOD IS LOVE. 

(March 30, 1856.) 

Psalmc. : " Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, ail ye lands. Serve 
the Lord with gladness : corne before His présence with singing. Know 
ye that the Lord He is God : it is He that hath made us, and not we our- 
selves ; we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His 
gâtes with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise : be thankful 
unto Him, and bless His name. For the Lord is good ; His mercy is ever- 
lasting ; and His truth endureth to ail générations." 

I asked our friend to read this Psalni to us, dear 
friends. I have only strength enough left to occupy 
myself with the love of God. That God has loved us, 
is the whole doctrine of the Gospel. Let us love God, 
is its whole moral. Although I hardly know if I have 
the power to make myself heard, I summon my little 
remaining strength to invoke, with you, the eternal 
and infinité love of God. 

O God, whose name is love, Thou who hast 
never done any thing to us, nor doest any thing to us, 



202 



GOD IS LOVE. 



nor wilt ever do any thing to us, otherwise than in 
and by love, how can I return Thee thanks enougli, 
when I see thèse my brethren drawn together by love 
around my bed of sickness and of suffering, and of 
that, besides, which Thou alone canst know ! I rejoiee 
in their love. "Who lias ever received more testimo- 
nies of love than I ? Should I not be the most un- 
grateful of rnen, if I were not the most thankful? 

Wherefore, O my God, I retnrn Thee thanks ; 
and still more, were it possible, do I thank Thee for 
Thy love — Thy love which has so sorely afflicted, but 
so powerfully sustained me. I confess Thy love, be- 
fore thèse who have never allowed me to want any 
help in their power to give, although I have been oft 
wanting in faith and patience, and far from having 
attained the perfect résignation to which I aspire. 

But Thou hast been to me kindness and goodness 
itself ; and, so long as a breath of life and strength may 
remain to me, will I confess it before thèse. Thy 
goodness, Thy goodness ! I thank Thee for Thy gratu- 
itous mercy, that Thou hast manifested Thy good- 
ness in freely pardoning, without merit of mine, ail my 
faults ; and, though the chief of sinners, the least of 
Thy children, the poorest of Thy servants, Thou hast 
heaped Thy mercies upon me, and made me an instru- 
ment for the advancement of Thy kingdom, even when 



GOD IS LOYE. 



203 



plunged, as to-day, in the extrême of weakness and 
suffering ! Oh, I thank Thee that Thou hast given 
me a Saviour ! "Without Him, O my God, I confess 
that I should be irrevocably lost, and plunged to-day 
in the most frightful despair. But I have a Saviour, 
who, by His blood shed, has saved me without money 
and without price, and I désire it to be known that I 
trust entirely and solely in that shed blood ; that ail 
my righteousness, ail my works which have been 
praised, my preachings which have been appreciated 
and admired — that ail this is in my eyes " as filthy 
rags," that I have nothing at ail in myself, capable 
of standing one moment before the brilliancy of Thy 
face, or the light of Thy sanctity. Now, however, it 
is not I who will be judged ; but Christ within me: 
and I know, I know, that He will enter in, and I with 
Him ; that He and I are so closely united that He 
can never enter in and leave me without. 

My God, T render Thee thanks with ail thèse my 
friends, to whom Thou hast accorded the same privi- 
lège, and the same consolation. To them hast Thou 
deigned, even as to me, to give the Holy Spirit, to 
apply to their soûls the free, gratuitous gift of life eter- 
nal, by the blood of Jésus Christ. 

I thank Thee fîrst for my dear family ; I thank 
Thee for my brothers and sisters, and for my friends 



204 



GOD IS LOVE. 



wlio have been ever brothers and sisters to me, and 
who are now testifying, by their love and their tears, 
their tender sympathy for me, though I deserve it in 
no wise, and confess myself entirely unworthy of it. 
But Thon hast put it into their hearts for me, to my 
great comfort and consolation. 

I thank Thee for ail things. I thank Thee for Thy 
consolations during the past week ; for the nomination 
of the professor of Montauban, which has been for ns 
a snbject of so much anxiety and prayer; for the 
peace 1 signed this very day, for which we have so ear- 
nestly supplicated Thee, knowing that peace on earth 
is conducive now, as formerly of old, to that peace 
which cometh from on high. 

Lord, I désire to be sincère before Thee. It is true 
that I am in much suffering, and that myjoy and 
thanksgivings are sorely clouded by constant pain and 
exhaustion. But Thou hast sustained me to this hour, 
and I have confidence that my prayers, and the pray- 
ers of my family and friends, will obtain for me the 
perfect patience which I crave. 

And now, Lord, I take ail thèse my friends, and 
lay them on Thy fatherly breast, in the name of Jésus, 
by the Holy Spirit. May there be not one in this 
room who will not be found in the eternal taberna- 

1 After the Crimean War. 



GOD IS LOVE. 



205 



cles ! Seated at tlie table of Abraham, of Isaac, and 
of Jacob, may we be able to recall, with unmingled 
joy, tbe day which brought us together hère ! O 
m y God, sanctify us wholly, and may ail that remains 
to us of life be entirely devoted to Thy service. May 
Thy Holy Spirit dwell in us, may it be our soul, our 
life, and our joy, both of ourselves, of our families, of 
our afflicted ones. O Lord, many of us hâve dear 
ones lying sick ; we commend them to Thee. I bear 
them ail upon my heart before Thee. I will not call 
them by name, lest in my weakness I forget and cause 
pain to any here ; but I take them ail, and lay them at 
the foot of the cross of Jésus, that Thou mayst console 
them and sanctify them. 

May Thy grâce and Thy peace be with us ail now 
and for evermore ! Amen. 



THE END. 



The Recovery of Jérusalem. 



BY 

Capt. WILSON, R. E., and Capt. WARREN, R. E., 

Etc., Etc. 

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SERMONS PREAGHED AT ST. JAMES' S CHAPE L. 

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18 CHRISTIAN CENTURIES. 



B Y 

THE REV. JAMES WHITE, 

AUTH0R ÛF A HISTORY OF FRANCE. 

1 Vol. 12mo. Cloth. 538 pages $1.75. 



CONTENTS. 

i. Cent.— The Bad Emperors. — II. The Good Emperors.— III. Ansr- 
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to Constantinople. — Establishment of Christianity. — Apostasy of Julian.— 
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France. — Index. 



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PRIMARY TRUTHS OF RELIGION. 



By Right Rev. THOMAS M. CLARK, D. D., LL. D., 

BISHOP OF EHODE ISLAND. 

1 vol., 12mo. Price, $1.00. 

From the Alligemeine Literarsche Zeiiung, Berlin : 

" We find in this book of the Bishop of Bhode Island a contribution to Christian 
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From a review in the Literary World, London: 

"We welcome this book from the pen of an American Bishop. Dr. Clark has done 
well in this volume on ' The Primary Truths of Keligion. 1 With clearness, concise- 
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From the New York Express : 

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